


Idylls of a King Forlorn

by Gloromeien



Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-08
Updated: 2017-05-08
Packaged: 2018-10-29 16:22:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 32,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10857675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gloromeien/pseuds/Gloromeien
Summary: In the fourth age, a mysterious stranger come to Minas Tirith, bearing ill news for King Elessar and his elven guards.





	1. Calen Lass

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimers: Characters belong to that wily old wizard himself, Tolkien the Wise, the granddad of all 20th century fantasy lit. I serve at the pleasure of his estate and aim not for profit.   
> Author’s Note: This is a tiny bit AU. Takes place during the reign of King Elessar; he has been on the throne for about 20 years at this point. The race of men has grown prosperous, though there are still remnants of the Shadow lurking about (as well as natural events that aren’t necessarily ‘evil’, just undomesticated, such as, oh, a troll. For all the ideas/depictions of elven grief and the ‘fading’, I am endlessly indebted to the excellent slashwriter Ilye, who’s work can be found in the Library of Moria. I was so moved by her own descriptions of these things that I had to give it a whirl myself, I hope she can forgive me the borrowing. I’ve made up a couple of characters: the darling Amaranthiel and the fallen Menethren. And the quote is from ‘Sonnets from the Portuguese by Elizabeth Barrett Brownîng.   
> Dedication: To the Pirate King, for the months of inspiration and those rapturous curls, and to my favorite audience member/critic/cheerleader/kindred spirit/Welsh person, whom I’ll call the Lady Cariad.

‘The lilies of our lives may reassure  
Their blossoms from their roots, accessible  
Alone to heavenly dews that drop not fewer,  
Growing straight, out of man’s reach, on the hill.’

 

Crouched between the jagged crags at the base of Emyn Arnen, the gray-cloaked interloper observed the sheer mountain slope unseen by the elf and the man-child scaling its surface. Such an uncommon sight for the hills of Minas Tirith, elfkind entrusted with the protection of a boy, but there they were, an elf as rugged many a ranger and a youth as lithe as the Eldar, ably grappling over the sleek, silver-flecked shards of the mountainside. 

The observer’s slate-dull cloak, as well as his seasoned hunting skills, easily kept him from the man-child’s detection. The elf was another matter entirely. Though the pale peaks of his ears were plain enough against a long, gleaming cascade of obsidian hair, his was the body of a warrior. Tall, lean, as the elfkind, but his limbs and torso thick with meat, more befitting the horsemen of Rohan. Far from limiting his natural grace, his movements seemed enhanced by this added weight, his every motion whispering of untold might restrained. Indeed, even his dress was foreign to the Eldar. Though his quiver bore the markings of Imladris, he preferred a ranger’s leather tunic, chaps, boots, and the fat-bellied sword of the witch-realm in the mountains of Angmar; his shift and cloak the deep violet of Gondor’s most revered knights, the King’s guard. His angular face and hawkish regard still betrayed elven refinement, though his mouth was unnaturally full, his lips sinuous, scarlet. 

As they neared the lower shelf of the slope, the elf-warrior paused, peerless, on the sheer edge, his burnished indigo eyes ruthlessly surveying the area. The interloper stilled, willing his breaths to deepen, his mind to quiet, the blood in his veins to lax. The elf stood, immovable, for several moments, then sprang onto the path as if a dancer in flight. 

“Eldarion!!” he called to the man-child. “This way!!” 

Before the youth could bother reply, the elf was over the next ridge. Though his voice had not yet turned, Eldarion could be heard to grumble, as he scampered up the last of the sheer face of the slope. At the sound of his naming, the hidden observer slightly raised the brim of his hood, his trenchant blue eyes taking closer stock of the struggling boy. The edges of his lips curved upwards appreciatively, half-smirk, half outright smile. /So this was Aragorn’s heir./ 

As the watcher shifted position to better observe the awkward young prince, a booming yawl resounded through the foothills. Before the kingling could even draw his sword, a horn-crowned cave troll, easily twenty times his size, barreled down towards him. The interloper leapt to his feet, then up onto a nearby rock, for better leverage should he need to intervene, the youth’s elven protector now far out of range. /For one of such might, the elf is careless with such a precious charge./ 

Eldarion, surprisingly agile, slid under the troll, then darted through a nearby forest of stalactites, dangerous ground for the creature’s crude bulk. The cave troll lunged, again and again, but the prince’s slender frame sped away at the last second. /His maneuvers are deft,/ the gray-cloaked stranger noted, /and the creature will soon tire. But will it be soon enough?/

The cave troll’s anguished groans echoed through the cliffs and crags, their force crumbling both the sheer face of the mountainside and the peaks of the stalactites. Eldarion, his nerves fraying, swung at the troll’s bludgeoning arms with the practiced precision of an apprentice swordsman, but the creature’s brute force time and again won over. At last, with a reactionary swat of titanic impact, the prince’s lithe frame collided with its monstrous arm, spun, then smacked into the merciless, defacing rock of the shelf wall. 

Without another thought, the hooded figure let the first of a flurry of lethally accurate arrows fly. Gelatinous spews of green blood burst from the cave troll’s neck, as the creature roared his last and fell. The youth, bathed in sickly muck, was soon on his feet again, the interloper now at his side. 

“I would have bested him, Uncle,” Eldarion squawked in frustration, momentarily blinded by the green goo. With a gentle chuckle, his cloaked savior offered him a handkerchief and was himself revealed. The prince gasped, grasped the hilt of his sword. 

“I am no threat to you, pen-neth,” the stranger assured him. “I am pledged to your father, the King. Who should, if I may be so bold, chose the guards to his heir with greater care.”

“It was a test,” the youth replied, rather testily, for one so young. The cloaked observer was instantly reminded of the boy’s father, and his more tempestuous nature in his youth. “I was to slay the cave troll.”

“But surely the intent was not for you to be slain, should you fail,” the interloper remarked. “Where is your guardian?”

“Seeking you out, I’ve no doubt,” the prince challenged, with undisguised ire. “His senses are keen.”

Before the hooded stranger could answer for himself, he jumped back, narrowly avoiding the incisive path of what was no doubt an arrow from the elf-warrior’s Imladrian quiver. 

“Reveal yourself, stranger,” the guardian hissed, dropping down from the ledge above them. “That is no peasant’s son you trifle with.”

“Then perhaps you should take greater care with him,” the stranger snipped, only the glint of his crisp cobalt eyes visible through the cloak-hood’s shadow. “Son of Elrond.”

The elf-warrior’s eyes shone a warm violet when he recognized one of his kin. “What business does a Mirkwood elf have so far from the East Bight?” 

“It is long since I lay in the fields of the Bight,” the archer sighed, lifting away the gray wool of his hood. “Though many a night past I have dreamt there, of snow-capped peaks and of misty marshes, and of Gondor’s gleaming white tower.” 

It was Legolas.

Upon the revelation of the elf-prince, Elrohir was doubly struck. Though elven refinement kept the tremors from his face, the Eldar had never before remarked upon the archer’s silken grace. Years ago, they had fought together in the War of the Ring. Perhaps the threat of destruction was too near, or the stench of death too sickening, but Elrohir held little memory of Legolas beyond his fervent battle cries, the fatal sting of his arrows, the lethal slice of his twin slit-knives. The smirking, porcelain-carved creature before him had no place in such black, violent remembrances. 

“Forgive me, edhel,” Elrohir all but whispered. “I mistook you for another.”

“Is there a Mirkwood archer who would dare threaten the life of the heir of Gondor?” Legolas chided mirthfully. “I must speak on this with my father.”

Elrohir’s embarrassment was thankfully masked by the young prince’s confusion. 

“Is you father a king?” Eldarion queried, now utterly befuddled by the day’s strange happenings. “Is this another of your brothers, Elrohir?”

“He is of my kin, mellon-nîn, and thus my brother-in-arms,” Elrohir replied, his eyes still locked on the Mirkwood prince’s wry expression. “And a great friend of your father’s. This is Legolas, son of Thranduil.” 

The boy’s face beamed with nothing short of awe.

“You are the fearless Legolas!!” the bedazzled youth exclaimed, knees quivering as if to bow. Legolas swallowed his mirth deeply down, then laid a fond hand on the crown of the prince’s raven hair. 

“And you are the picture of your mother, pen-neth,” Legolas noted with affection. “Aragorn’s pride must suffer greatly.” Legolas winked slyly at Elrohir, then rested his hand on the boy’s shoulder. “But come, I have urgent business with the King.”

“Your return will lighten his spirits, meldir,” Elrohir remarked, upon reflection, somewhat stupidly. “For these are burdensome times. The Queen has birthed yet another daughter, the delicate princess Amaranthiel.”

To his surprise, the archer’s face grew darker.

“My return, perhaps, may cheer him,” Legolas replied, a shadow falling over his soft features. “My news may not be such comfort.”

*****************

Though the feast before them befit the return of Arathorn from the grave, few of the company tasted a scrap of it, once Legolas began his tale. The Mirkwood prince himself had remarked on its opulence, decrying recent years of rabbit stew, dewberries, and lembas bread from his adventures in Fangorn forest, though he would only sip fitfully at his wine and swallow the occasional spoon of broth, for respite more than hunger. 

Earlier, King Elessar had blessed him with the warmest of welcomes, clasping the reluctant elf tightly against him and murmuring gratitudes into the sharp peaks of his ears. Legolas had bore it graciously, Elrohir had noted, his not uncommon smirk of bemusement in ample evidence throughout the numerous salutations at court. With her fussy, darling Amaranthiel to occupy her, Queen Arwen had made her excuses, leaving Aragorn, Eldarion, and Elrohir to lunch with the new arrival. 

Legolas remained jovial for much of the meal, as the King spoke fondly of the trials of his reign and the archer recounted tales of his years in the Glittering Caves. His traveling companion, the dwarf Gimli, had been called to the home of his great-great-granddaughter, who had born quadruplets and was shamefully short-handed. The thought of Gimli tending to his great-great-great-grandchildren carried their mirth through to the main course.

“You seek another companion, gwanur-nîn?” Aragorn suggested, with a twinkle. “You have returned to force my abdication and claim me as your own?”

Legolas, indeed the entire company, laughed heartily.

“And what of your daughters?” the archer teased. “Who would protect their honor, in your absence?”

“I would!!” Eldarion exclaimed scornfully, to the amply great amusement of his elders.

“Indeed, you would, mellon-nîn,” Elrohir encouraged softly. “Once you have bested the cave troll.”

Elrohir was pleased to note that this last comment restored the glint to the archer’s aquamarine eyes, not seen since that morning’s encounter. He smiled, almost imperceptibly, across the table at Legolas, who swiftly averted his dimming gaze. A chill passed through the elf-warrior. 

“Your absence has been felt, Legolas,” the King suddenly turned solemn. “You have strayed far too long. The babe that was born on your last visit is now almost grown.” Aragorn nodded towards Eldarion, who reeled in astonishment. “I hope you will tarry here awhile, meldir.”

Legolas fell silent, his natural elven calm suddenly eerily distressing. 

“You were correct in your presumption that I seek out your company, Evinyatar,” the archer began, with cautious deliberation. The formal address unsettled the King, who drew back in his seat, the set of his jaw taking on a regal solidity. 

“Ai’nad in my power to grant is yours, Prince of Mirkwood,” Aragorn responded, his tone officious. “I will not fail you.”

“Ay, I know, gwanur.” Legolas bowed his head. “Forgive my formality, I simply…” He raised his eyes again, their color darkened to a deep midnight. “Upon my return from the Glittering Caves in Fangorn, I sojourned in the remains of Lothlorien. There, I received word from Mirkwood. Other than a few servants, my father and Menethren, his chief counsel, were all that remained of the wood-elves. A dragon struck the northern thatch of forest. It would have burned the entire wood to ash, had Menethren not rode out. The forest was saved from the dragon’s wrath… Menethren… he fell, Aragorn.” 

As the Eldar fell, so did a deadening silence over the table.

“My Adar… my father is fading. Menethren was… *is*, perhaps closer to the bone, his melethron…his beloved. I am told he will not last out the month.”

“Can he not be bound to another, Legolas?” the King asked, with learned temperance. 

“He refuses,” the prince acknowledges. “He wishes to pass on to the Halls of Mandos, to be reunited with Menethren who is slain. I cannot fault him such a wish.” Legolas took another dull sip of wine, more to wet his parched mouth than to savor its dry flavor. “I would not ask that you undertake such a journey, aran Gondor… but there is no one to sing for him. None but me to carry him to Imladris, to be shroud in the Eternal Flame. Adar was the King… Menethren a valiant warrior. They deserve their honor.”

“And they shall have it.” 

It was as gentle a pronouncement as King Elessar had ever made, but its simplicity spoke volumes to the assembled company. 

“I shall journey with you to Mirkwood, gwanur-nîn, fear not.” Aragorn met the archer’s wounded eyes with his own steady gaze. “Together we shall lament the fall of the green forest.”

“I shall join you, if you will,” Elrohir cautiously added. “It has been some years since I have seen Adar, Elladan, Imladris...”

Legolas allowed himself the faintest of smiles: “I would be glad of it, mellon-nîn. Your voice is of peculiar melody, if I recall.” Elrohir, startled by his praise, could only nod in deference.

“Eldarion, you shall accompany us, as well,” Aragorn decreed, dismissing the hushed tone of the proceedings and moving on to more practical matters. “Time you learnt to appreciate the many shades of ruling a kingdom.” 

The young prince’s eyes, alight with wonder, were soon tempered by the thought of the journey’s sad purpose. 

“We set out at dawn,” Aragorn announced with finality, turning to Legolas one last time. A twinge of satisfaction could not help but spark his drawn features. “We ride again, my brother.”

****************************

The court minstrels strummed a blithe, lilting Edhellondrian melody, the strains as vaporous as sea foam, when Arwen swept onto the terrace of the White Tower of Gondor, Amaranthiel nestled tight against her heart, finally at rest. Though rose-red embers still floated above the horizon, the evening’s celebrations were already waning, the courtiers well aware of the trials of the journey to come and many preparations yet to be attended to. 

Most of the Gondorian nobles had retired; the King, however, was sequestered beneath the eastern turret by his councilmen, who had not received the news of his imminent departure well. Legolas, the cause of all this – celebration and inquisition both – kept vigil close by, though weary, instinctively protective of his adanellyn.

Her brother loomed by the hearth-fire; his reflective eyes aglow with lilac flames, but his ears, she well knew, scouting for signs of unrest among the councilmen. Elrohir loved, and was beloved, of man and elfkind both - his years with the Rangers proof enough of the duality of his nature – but though he was often champion of edain bravery among the Eldar, he knew their weakness cut just as deep. Even in times of peace, the most elvellyn among the edain could prove treacherous, where the safety of their King was concerned. 

Arwen doubted not of his safety on this journey, simply of his peace of mind. Estel had attended his share of Eldar memorials, but this demise of the Greenwood of Thranduil would leave its black mark on every member of the company. Her one comfort was the presence of her father and the gentle Glorfindel, at Imladris, who would cater to both the ritual and the spiritual needs of the mourners. /Perhaps, if Amanranthiel proves of sweet a disposition as her sisters, I shall join them at Rivendell./ 

Her infant daughter now heavy with slumber, Arwen took a seat by the hearth-fire, her concern for Elrohir’s spirit even more acute than her frettings over her husband’s. Her brother’s regard for the Mirkwood prince was unmistakable to one who knew him so intimately; the elf-warrior’s attention had scarcely wavered for an instant from the fair calenlass, since his unexpected arrival. /He is too long in the world of men,/ Arwen reflected, as her brother blessed her with fond regard. /Though he is pledged to Estel, he longs for elvellyn company./ 

“Another little treasure,” Elrohir murmured, as he bent over to kiss his dormant niece’s brow. “I expect she will be grown some, when I return.”

“She will be bright as a jewel,” Arwen remarked playfully. “She will still sparkle at the sight of you, nîn bellas.” Elrohir seemed not to hear, his cautious gaze drifting once more towards the east turret. “And you, gwanur? Will you have grown some upon your return?”

A smile threatened her brother’s stern lips, but they held tight. 

“I marvel at his resolve, sellath,” Elrohir commented solemnly. “To watch your father fade, to know the kingdom you would rule will soon vanish without a trace, your legacy smote in dragon’s fire… your homeland abandoned…”

“I have not known you to be so melancholy, Elrohir,” Arwen chided delicately. “The time of the Eldar in Middle-Earth is ending, the few that remain… there will come a time when you, too, will long for Valinor. Estel is all that keeps you.”

“This is my home, Arwen,” Elrohir snapped, unthinking. “Do you think yourself the only edhel in Middle-Earth who would forgo an eternity in Valinor for love of this land and her true people?”

Arwen smiled softly to herself, her brother’s resolve both intent and admirable. She would not press him further, her tone again turning mischievous.

“Are you certain it is the edain Gondor who enthrall you, gwanur-nîn?” she teased. “Your attentions seem fixed on…others.” Elrohir could not keep the sheepish grin from curling his sinuous lips. “He is weary, and morose. Estel is skilled at shifting his council’s concerns towards his own. Perhaps the prince’s mind would be eased by a turn in the garden?”

“Perhaps,” her brother replied enigmatically. After further long moments entranced by the firelight, the elf-warrior bowed his head. “I would ask a service of you, sellath.”

“Ai’nad, gwanur-nîn.”

“The journey will be long,” Elrohir began, his voice barely more than a swift exhalation. “Our bond, uncertain. I would take Rites with him, before the morn. It will ease his pain.”

“Of what Rites do you speak, Elrohir?” Arwen’s face darkened, in deep confusion. She was well aware of the customs of elfkind and had never heard tell of any Rites. 

“Among the warriors of our kind…” he haltingly explained. “The warrior’s passion on the battlefield can overtake him, as well as… during the Rites of love. Often, in the history of our people, warring tribes came together of necessity, to fight a stronger foe, a greater menace. The chieftains of these tribes must reconcile their own difference, must build a common trust, in order to ally themselves fully. Thus, on the eve of battle, they would enact the Rites of love, giving their body’s pledge to the other. It became custom, over time, when embarking on a journey, or a quest… or during the quest, to renew the pledge, to comfort an ailing comrade… It is custom. To set the mind, and the body, to the task at hand, and not… but the request must be formally made. By a third party.” 

“And you ask me to…?” Arwen swallowed a definite giggle.

“He is a hallowed warrior,” Elrohir quickly added. “The request need not be… elaborate. He will know of what you speak.” 

After some inner-deliberation, Arwen rose to her feet, bending gingerly over to kiss her brother’s flushed brow. With lithe, measured steps, the Queen tread calmly in the direction of the east turret, her rich, crimson gowns wafting in her wake. 

Elrohir watched her float across the terrace, his hawk-eyes rapt, anxious.

Though he had been observing the siblings’ conversation for some time, Legolas greeted the Queen with a warm, unknowing smile. His senses ever-attuned to the moods, the tones, and the postures of the surrounding company, as any cunning fighter’s should be, Legolas was as conscious of the peredhil’s veiled scrutiny as he was of the councilmen’s scorn, the fiddle player’s growing fatigue, and the slumbering princess’ dulcet dreams. As Arwen approached him, he relaxed his guard, the dull ache returning to his shoulders and his back creaking unmercifully. / I need rest,/ he remarked inwardly, not for the first time that evening. /Perhaps Valinor beckons after all./ 

Much as Mandos lured him, he would not leave while Aragorn’s light still shone. His tired eyes flicked from Arwen to Elrohir. /So many wait-out the King’s lifetime./ 

“The battle rages on, mellon-nîn?” Arwen queried, now at his side. 

“I fear it will last out the night,” Legolas almost groaned. “You would think he was their lover. Were it not for all the children you’ve born him…” This last restored the twinkle to the archer’s chill cerulean eyes. Arwen chuckled fondly. 

“Indeed, my husband is a potent menace in every aspect of his kingdom,” Arwen smirked, some might even say wickedly, at her kinsman. “By which I am reminded to beseech you to keep him well, Prince of Mirkwood. There may well be another prince or princess to coddle upon his return.”

At this wondrous news, Legolas laughed outright, which drew the deeply-creased frowns of several councilors. 

“I will keep him well, meldir, fear not,” Legolas quietly assured her, the mirth all but drained from his face. 

“You are weary, Legolas,” Arwen cooed, with grave concern. “Will you not take some rest? Elrohir has bade me ask if you will claim a warrior’s right, and take Rites with him.” Legolas regarded her, just then, with a mixture of surprise and peculiar intent. “There is a bath in his chamber, and…” 

“Elrohir would take Rites with me?” Legolas seemed to consider more than ask, growing pensive. His gaze crept over to the fireside, but the peredhil was gone. To his chambers, no doubt. /Such confidence./

Despite his exhaustion, the archer found his journey-worn body bristled, sparking in anticipation of a night’s indulgence with the dark, rogueish elf-warrior. Not since the Quest for the Ring had Legolas lain with another, and never before out of any deep affection, simply need. Indeed, a warrior’s Rites, in these peaceful times, were a rare luxury; a ritual the archer had only experienced once before. The memory of that scarlet evening, coupled with his body’s insistent approval of such needed indulgence, swayed his mind. Added to the fact that it would be Elrohir’s burden, as the initiator, to please /him…/

“If you will excuse me, mellon-nîn,” Legolas bowed politely, as Arwen swallowed yet another mischievous smile. “I believe my fatigue has finally caught up with me.”

*************************

As he padded surreptitiously down the winding halls that led to the royal bedchambers, Legolas struggled to quell his body’s growing anticipation. Thoughts of the elf-warrior’s raven beauty, of his swordsman’s bulk and his archer’s grace, of his edain roughness and his edhil luminosity, clouded the prince’s already weighted mind. As he searched, distractedly, for the Imladrian’s door, his skin simmered, restless, his tongue sponged his mouth ruthlessly dry, and his loins tensed to aching. Legolas feared that one brief touch of the Eldar’s lips to his skin would be his undoing. / It has been far, far too long…/ 

At last recognizing the elven blessing inscribed on the arching door-frame, Legolas paused before the peredhil’s chambers, a small slip of his mind still concerned that Elrohir had invoked the warriror’s Rites. Why had he not simply approached him? Why such formality? They had fought in the War of the Ring together, was that not proof enough of their allegiance? The situation did not sit right with the archer, but he would broach the topic at a later time. At present, he found he could no longer ignore the gnawing, wanting throb at the center of his being. 

His sword, as they say, was at the ready. 

Before he could raise a hand to knock, a voice inside bade him enter. As he made his way into the heart of the rooms, Legolas was enveloped by the voluptuous scents of the Imladrian baths: cinderlocke, pealshell, and rich vergammon flower. As he loosened the laces of his tunic, he recalled the long night he’d lingered at the baths, with Boromir, soaking in the fuming swirls, drinking miruvor, and praising the coming renewal of Gondor’s White Tower. If only the brave adan could be here to witness it’s current glory… 

“Suilad, elmellyn.” Elrohir’s welcome broke through the prince’s sensory meanderings; his bare, beckoning torso silenced any lingering doubts as to the rightness of these Rites. Legolas stroked his gaze appreciatively, deliberately, over the elf-warrior’s sculpted frame, the tightly-knotted, diaphanous sarong wound around his slim waist the only attempt at modesty. His pearlescent black hair hung in loose, wanton waves over his shoulders, the tips licking at the delicate wisps of hair circling his purple nipples, proof of his half-edain heritage. His ripe, violet eyes shone out, unrestrained, as fierce and mesmerizing as the elen above. 

Legolas was breathless. 

“Put yourself at ease, calenlass-nîn,” Elrohir murmured, as he advanced towards him. “Give no thought to your troubles. I will soothe what ails you.” The peredhil’s thick, calloused fingers caressed the length of his face, as he leaned in for a first, tentative kiss. 

With firm purpose, Legolas placed a warm hand at the center of Elrohir’s chest. 

“You claim a warrior’s right, gwanur-nîn,” Legolas reminded him. “We cannot embrace as lovers.” 

Elrohir’s face softened, whispering lightly: “And who is here to know, melethron? I would give you every pleasure…”

“Forgive me, mellon-nîn, but I would not lead you falsely,” Legolas cooed, fearful that the prince might chafe at his words. “A warrior’s Rites I am here to claim. I cannot… I will not lay claim to the rule of your heart.” Elrohir seemed to accept this, exhaling with little difficulty.

“It is I who must ask your forgiveness, elmellyn,” the elf-warrior beseeched him. “I mistook… it is forgotten. Please… your bath is drawn. Do not forgo such well-deserved ministrations for my assumptions…”

“Aye, indeed, I shall not,” the prince assured him, taking hold of his hands, beckoning them to disrobe him. With a grateful, affectionate glance, Elrohir obliged.

Despite his earlier pledge, the full sight of the golden Eldar’s lissome, crystalline beauty deeply affected the Imladrian prince. The muslin wash of his skin, the fine craft of his shoulders, the sensuous slope of his navel, which, once Elrohir shed his riding chaps, revealed a shaft of such tongue-leadening potency as the darkling elf had not thought possible. Nevertheless, he momentarily stifled his own desire, guiding Legolas into the molten depths of the bathwater. 

With eager, nimble fingers, Elrohir undid the tight weaving of his braids, then wove his hands through the archer’s flaxen hair, massaging the scalp. Legolas sighed, sinking in, his features laxing into blissful serenity. As Elrohir’s silken touch moved down his neck to his shoulders, Legolas leaned his golden crown back against the Eldar’s chest and softly began to sing.

It was unlike any elven song Elrohir had heard before, almost decadent in its richness, the prince’s opulent, eloquent voice as thick as a mouthful of cream. The effect was viscerally sensual; the languorous rhythms seeped through his senses, starting a slow burn over his skin, searing down his spine, and singeing into every cell of his being. The raven-haired elf swooned despite himself, caught in the rapture of the archer’s song. 

With able, knowing arms, Legolas divested him of the sarong and lured him into the balming waters, crawling over him, stroking the entire, incendiary length of their bodies together. Soon, his velvet touch seemed everywhere at once, over his legs, down his arms, up his back, across the heaving plain of his chest, through the sleek waves of his sodden hair, that slow, seductive song ever beckoning. 

With his own fierce, guttural moan, he succumbed to the archer’s passion.


	2. Namar

/“Let the world’s sharpness, like a clasping knife,  
Shut in upon itself and do no harm  
In this close hand of Love, now soft and warm,  
And let us hear no sound of human strife  
After the click of the shutting.”/

The path was worn, the dirt scattered at the edges, entire lengths densely covered with spills of autumn leaves, but Aragorn had tread it too often to mistake his way. Even twenty years on, the day he’d first set eyes on the Argonath, the day Boromir fell, razed through his mind like a flaming arrow at the Helm.

As the curled tip of the wide-bellied canoe bit into his collarbone, the King gazed up at the relics of ages past, his kin, and silently wondered, not for the first time, if they would have chosen as fatefully as he, had they born his burdens. Though at times his destiny seemed not of his own choosing, but that of some bittersweet hand, he could not fault the Valar’s hallowed guidance; if they could have been said to guide him, a man. /Perhaps I fell under the great light of the Evenstar./

Collapsing the canoe on the hilltop, they halted their portage for the night. Preferring the sanctuary of the trees, the King left his companions to raise the camp. Memories of this place clasped him tightly. He wandered up onto a forgotten king’s mighty sandal, a part of him ever mindful of the elves’ progression below, and his son’s protection. 

Hours – yet mere moments – later, a cry pricked sharply through his solemn reverie. His agile glare plunged down to the campground, where Legolas fired ripe, oozing frogberries at a livid Eldarion, fresh from a swim in the river. The prince, chest dripping with splotches of purple gore, devised swift revenge, pummeling the archer with several fistfuls of limestone pebbles. The battle escalated, but the King turned his eyes away, glad that Legolas still found some merriment despite the gray purpose of their journey.

“Your ministrations have kept him well,” Aragorn remarked, in lieu of a welcome, to the Eldar lurking in the woods nearby, not doubt seeking his counsel. Elrohir cursed to himself, then sprang up the foot, to join him. 

“He is not one for grief,” the elf-warrior dismissed, swooping down beside the King with all the elegance of his kind. “He holds much regard for his father, for his choice, but in the manner of a soldier for his general’s bravery in the day’s battle.”

Aragorn nodded, judging this wisdom profound. 

“Legolas is the soul of mischief, of valor, and loyal to a fault,” the King observed. “I would not cross him lightly. Yet his heart is… cold. I have seen him pursued all his life by elf-maids, by my kinswomen, and by elvellyn of all stations. He hath lain with them for sport, at times, he hath befriended most who pined for him… but he hath never loved.”

“What?” Elrohir started, unsettled by this revelation. “Never loved another?”

“His spark is too bright to kindle a single flame,” Aragorn argued. He turned his slate-blue eyes away from the shore, up to the blushing horizon. “On this very shore, I knew him… while my kinsman betrayed us… while he lay dying…”

At this, the elf-warrior vehemently shook his head. In the looming twilight, shadows creased his angular features. 

“Boromir died bravely,” Elrohir insisted. “And *rightly*, Aragorn. He was tempted by the Ring. He would not have let the hobbits be. He would have burdened you further.”

“His death is my burden,” Aragorn mused.

“You have restored his city to glory,” his foster-brother assured him. “Boromir did not die in vain.” The King seemed to accept this, the ache in his eyes rescinding. He thrust a steady, leaden gaze upon the Eldar. 

“I have known him,” he cautioned. “Known his sweetness. Known the fever of his song. It envelops you, ensnares you, and you cannot resist. You are well to comfort him, for comfort is dearly needed, but do not mistake restoration for reverence. So few of your gentle kind remain in these lands. I would not see another fade. Certainly not one so beloved, mellon-nîn.” 

At that, Elrohir snorted proudly, but betrayed a creeping sorrow. 

“I would not fade for love of him,” the elf-warrior declared, with false-timbered bluster.

The King nodded once, chastely, his solemn stare again finding the shore; the yellowed patch, at the forest’s edge, where Boromir had lain. 

He shut his eyes, resolutely, attempting to forget the past, to dismiss the ghost of the future…

***************************

Their hunger sated by a fine roast quintail hen with the requisite crushed frogberry glaze, the King and the two princes tucked up by the fire with the bitter Ithilien mead and tales of journeys long ended. To the Mirkwood elf’s astonishment, Aragorn had never fully recounted to his son of their months in the Fellowship of the Ring, nor his pursuit and capture of the creature Gollum. 

Polishing both their weapons and the last of the mead, the two warriors began the sprawling tale. Their voices lifted to embellish certain passages, fell hush to further enthrall the young prince. Fondly, they mimicked old friends, which often had them laughing, complicit, at some private remembrance. Eldarion devoured every last detail, rapt, occasionally glazing with awe at his father, as if he’d transformed into another being entirely. He knew of Estel, beloved to his mother, Elessar, King of Gondor, and Evinyatar, the renewer. Aragorn the man had often eluded him, however, and as for the valiant Strider, the Ranger… he struggled to perceive the remnants of this rogue’s cunning in his father’s just, noble ways. 

Elrohir had early made his excuses, preferring to steal a private moment in the tent he shared with his elf-brother. Like Eldarion, the trek to Mirkwood had uncovered many mystifying secrets for the darkling elf. These troubled him. Unlike his twin, Elladan, loremaster of Imladris, who took to brooding more often than not, Elrohir typically favored action over deep reflection. To his mind, few were the trials that could not be overcome with a sword, with a decree, or with a ceremony of some mystical nature. Elladan often chided him for ignoring the nuance of elven existence; for this reason, perhaps, he preferred the cruder ways of man-kind. Yet, on the foot of his forbears, Aragorn had proven himself as deeply shaded as an elf-lord… 

With a patient hand, Elrohir struck the wind-chime, then lit the frayed wick of his stick of ederwood essence. The musk-rich, gauzy smoke soon wafted around him, as he assumed the position of worship before his makeshift altar. He exhaled longly, voiding his lungs of his life’s breath, courting favor with the Valar. He prayed to those ethereal ones, for the light of knowledge to guide his path, for the strength of a steady hand, for wisdom in a vital choice. 

The thick, gossamer fumes eased him into a fugue. Time passed in vaporous drips, balming, replenishing the confounded recesses of his consciousness. He gave himself to the languorous rhythm, all thoughts of archers, fading kings, and bereaved warriors dissipating into the void around him. 

A chill wind washed over his back, the ederwood smoke sucked out into the bitter, riverside night. With cautious movements, Elrohir snuffed out the essence stick, struck the chime. His prayer-heavy frame stretched out along the top of his bedroll, his head drunkenly sluggish. It was often this way, if he surrendered himself entirely to worship; in truth, the light, mesmerized feeling pleased him. 

It was several moments before he realized Legolas had entered with the wind.

“Are you well, mellon-nîn?” the archer inquired, frowning slightly. “You move as though chained to the ground. You consumed little at supper, though the quintail was fine…”

“I have sung to the Valar,” Elrohir murmured. He struggled to fully open his eyes, to show Legolas the fading glow of the higher state shimmering therein. 

The Prince of Mirkwood knelt beside him, placing a tense palm against his cheek and indeed seeing the lilac blooms of his eyes. Satisfied that his companion was of good health, he rose to shed his boots, tunic, leggings… then shivered violently at the sting of the bitter air. 

“You are cold? Come, I will warm you,” Elrohir beckoned, still somewhat dazed. His oft-translucent skin was flushed a deep rose, the meditative state of the Eldar almost womb-like, for some. 

Legolas could not resist. Without hesitation, he slipped into the prince’s embrace, resting his golden head against Elrohir’s warm chest. With a long, relaxed sigh, the darkling elf extended his arm over the length of the prince’s back. 

Despite the comfort of this stolen moment, Elrohir’s senses sharpened anew. 

“You are weary, meldir?” 

“I am well,” the archer assured him, though his tone lacked conviction. “The young prince never seems to tire. You are well-matched.”

“Aye, he is spirited,” Elrohir smiled fondly. “Much like his mother, in our youth.”

Legolas thought on this. He added: “It is a grave pity he does not more resemble the King. When his soul passes… this world will have indeed… lost.”

“Think not on such darkness, mellon-nîn,” the elf-warrior cooed. “There will be legions to mourn him. We will find solace together.” At the archer’s continued silence, Elrohir ventured further. “Though I am ever thankful an elf cannot fade for love of man-kind. Our people would be decimated.” 

Legolas allowed himself a smirk, at this, but his eyes held fast to solemnity. 

“It is Aragorn you love, then,” Elrohir cut to the quick. “I knew one so fair would not leave his heart to decay.” 

At this, the archer laughed outright.

“Love Aragorn?! Surely you gest!!” The Mirkwood prince raised his head to meet the son of Elrond’s cool, indigo eyes with mirth-brimming blues. Still, he soon tempered. “The aran Gondor is as true to me as the brother of my heart, for certes, and as such I love him dearly… these are not romantic pledges. They are those of a warrior to his king, of one brother to another, not… but I protest too much. You will think me besotted with him.”

“Nay, I do not,” the Imladrian prince reassured him. “I know well the devotion of which you speak. I merely wondered… what illustrious soul could have, in the past, won such a valiant heart as yours.” 

Legolas again fell silent, though his glare spiked out to lock with Elrohir’s own. “Why do you ask this?”

“The King claims you have never loved. I could not believe it so.”

The archer shrugged, softened. His cheek returned to the small of the elf-warrior’s now tepid chest, his answer trickled across the paled skin. 

“I never saw the need of it,” he hushedly began. “It brings only pain, or uncertainty, or grief. I am not made for such things. I longed for the world… but never for another with such passion that I would forsake my freedom, my adventuring… it strikes to the heart of me, the calling from Valinor. I would not leave Middle-Earth. I am content with these lands to travel, with my friends among her peoples… “ Legolas grew restless, eager to dismiss the topic. “And you, elmellyn?”

“Seldom through my years have I loved,” Elrohir admitted. “But well. Yes, dearly well. An elf-maid, in my youth… but she proved intemperate, marrying another during my absence. I was all-too easily consoled by a fearsome Galadrim. A horseman of the Rohan, in the last age, and before, a noble son of Osgilliath. They are well-sung, in my orisons.” The elf-warrior grew somber, his own thoughts clouded by doubt. “I pray Elbereth it will favor me again, before Elladan and I must chose our fate.”

“Your Fate?” Legolas queried intently. “Which is this?”

“We are not true Eldar, as you know,” the peredhil explained, his features severe. “We have little time, after Estel’s passing, to chose between passing to Valinor and remaining in Middle-Earth to die a mortal. If my Adar remains to mourn our sister, perhaps we shall see the autumn of Eldarion’s rule… but his thoughts are turning to the sea. Valinor beckons him.”

“Cursed place,” Legolas almost spit, curling further into the elf-warrior’s solid frame. “We are of one mind, mellon-nîn. I would that we could ride the wilds together, without end.” Then, with less venom. “You would make a fine companion.” 

“Better than the dwarf?” Elrohir teased, but could not shake the frost seeping through his veins, the thought of forsaking centuries at the archer’s side for the placid meadows of Valinor sickening his soul. 

“Aye, perhaps,” Legolas laughed, though there was little mirth in its timbre. “Certainly less quarrelsome…” 

****************************

The forest howled. The cracked, gutted trunks spiked up, around them, cindered black as granite shards. Those that had not yet fallen hung limp, compliant over their gnarled roots, their branches abruptly severed, the bark stripped to the bone, clumps of blood-red sap clotted around the wounds. The jaundiced patches of grass, amid the ash-field of the forest ground, stood, stagnant, in the fetid air, oblivious to the stench of petroleum and of decay. 

Legolas lurched through the last of his cherished Mirkwood, his vision blurred, sodden. He could not hear his footsteps for the din of nature’s tortured wails; his tears gratefully blinding him to the bird skeletons, flower shreds, and occasional horse carcasses rotting in the firebeast’s foul mulch. Aragorn walked mere steps behind him, ever-mindful of the elvellyn’s hold on his composure, while Eldarion and Elrohir clutched one to the other, both equally determined, equally forlorn. 

Despite his intense distress, a virile, voracious anger kept Legolas at the helm of this black fellowship, though he mourned his dear-held forest, he would not allow the fire-breather’s destruction to torch his resolve. Blotting a coarse sleeve over his eyes, he strode on, relentless, through the smoke-hung hollows of the forest’s remains, ever-vigilant. 

Suddenly, warning stabbed through his spine. Before he could give his fears voice, Elrohir had drawn his witch-sword, Anduil’s feral glint flashed behind him, and the kingling’s new bow was strung tight. 

The Warg-pack was on them before they could breathe in. 

After witnessing the ravaging of his homeland, Legolas found relief in the slice of his arrows, as they put out eyes, pierced tender hide, and punctured fur-thick throats into a bloody spew. He blazed through the mire of hack and slash like a bolt of lightening, chasing down one particularly rabid creature as he vaulted off a tree trunk, claws spread, to maul Eldarion. The archer shot true, twice, thrice, in the neck, then sprung his silver knives in one fleet motion and mercilessly gutted the beast. The youth gaped at his playmate’s ferocity, but there was little time to spare. 

The Wargs seemed to come from every direction, their broken bodies soon piling up with the other remains, the parched grass-blades adrift in the dark crimson rivers. The King and his son dammed the flow from the East, a golden head amid the carnage to the North, while a darkling menace slaughtered fervently to the West. To the South, the cerulean crags of the Mirkwood Mountains loomed large, as foreboding as they were impassive. 

At last, the charge of Wargs weakened, the North-come horde lessening (or the deadly archer’s reputation spreading). Aragorn and Eldarion caught up with two of the more cunning devils to his right, Legolas instead turned his attention to Elrohir, at his left. Though his sword was mighty, the elf-warrior’s blows missed as often as they struck, the Eldar visibly struggling to mark his target. While the edain brethren were still going strong, the steadfast edhel could not catch his breath. This angered him enough to force a feral burst of precision, soon ebbing into self-defense. 

A chill passed over Legolas’ heart, but he did not let it linger. Instead, he shot off a flurry of rapacious blades, the Wargs surrounding Elrohir soon a clump of blood-slick fur at his feet. His fury spent, Legolas trudged over to his kinsman and slung a weary arm over his shoulders. 

“The trees… their weeping…” Elrohir remarked, quick to justify his fatigue. “They haunted me… I could not block them out.” He stopped to catch his breath, ever-conscious of his poor showing. “I thank you, calenlass, for your-“

“There is no need,” Legolas assured him, a frisson jutting down his spine at the Eldar’s defensiveness. “I would have fallen many times over, had your sharp eyes not found me in distress at the gates of Mordor, gwanur-nin.” 

The darkling elf’s warm, violet eyes met his in gratitude, but Legolas’ gaze could not let his half-truth shine through to comfort him. Instead, they grew wanting. 

“We will take Rites, at my father’s house,” Legolas whispered salaciously, hoping to distract the Eldar from his growing distress. “You shall favor me then.” 

“With all the skill in my power,” Elrohir replied with a flick of his tongue, though his body cringed at the thought of further exertion. 

“Come, elvellyn!!” Aragorn called over to them. “ We go East. The dark does not wait!!”

*************************

Night had long fallen when the journeymen stole up the torch-lit steps of Thranduil’s tree-top refuge. Menethren’s valor had saved the giant wood-oaks that sheltered the Sindarin tribe, though none remained in the thatch of bow-houses but the fading King, a few servants, and one unexpected guest. 

“Mae govannen, gwanur-nin,” Elladan declared, as he swept both his twin and his foster brother into his arms. Eldarion, bedazzled anew, could not rip his eyes from the be-gowned Eldar, an exact replica of Elrohir with the exception of his tranquil, gray eyes, his learned demeanor, and his loremaster’s frame. Though once a strength equal to the elf-warrior’s, long years in the libraries of Imladris had refined his once meat-thick limbs into a more elven sleekness, unlike Elrohir, who remained a potent mixture of elf and of man. 

Elladan moved serenely through the newly-met company, over to the Mirkwood prince. Legolas’ eyes remained stricken, as before, their earlier ferocity snuffed by the dank halls of his home. The haunts of his childhood were now truly haunted, empty of their devout, welcoming population, harkening for the return of those that had forsaken them. Guilt striking to his core, he gripped the Eldar’s outstretched hands with undisguised despair. 

“Mae govannen, calenlass,” Elladan stated, bowing solemnly. “I fear he is not long of this world. He waits, I believe, but for your return.” 

Legolas nodded, squeezing his hands as if to draw strength from them, then straightened his posture, chin bravely up. Without another second’s pause, he strode forth, to the front of the company, and marched evenly through the halls, to his father’s rooms. The others quickly followed, at the ready. 

Aragorn, never one to dismiss unforeseen events, fell back to Elladan’s side. 

“Please, do not mistake my intent,” he began his inquisition. “But how is it that you come to be in Mirkwood?” 

Elladan smiled softly, as if wondering what had taken the King so long to ask. “It is a curiosity, this twinship I share. Even at such distance, if Elrohir feels something acutely… I sensed only an urgent need of my presence in the Green Wood. I knew not what had befallen, nor does my father, as yet. I discovered the King’s grave plight upon my arrival.” 

Aragorn accepted this, clasping a warm hand to his foster-brother’s shoulder. “I am glad of your company. Your wisdom is well needed. The road has been… a trial.” 

“I doubt it not,” Elladan replied, casting cautious eyes towards the rest of their severe companions. Despite the urgency of the situation, he stopped the King, letting the others push on. “Tell me true, Estel. Is my brother well?” 

Aragorn swallowed hard. It was not the time for such confidences, but Elladan’s interruption of their sworn charge spoke volumes of the gravity of his concern in this matter.

“I cannot say for certain,” Aragorn insisted. “But he is not… as he ever was.”

“Do you suspect a cause?”

“Have you felt… something… when this twinness overtakes you…?”

Elladan sighed mightily, but did not hasten to reply. “I, too, am not certain of the cause of these... troubles. It is not sickness. I feel he is somehow… diminished? I am unsure. I can say only that his spirit… the spirit of his self, inside me, of our oneness… at times… it grows cold, Estel.”

The King’s features grew increasingly resigned, but he would not comment on the matter further. 

“We tarry too long,” he compelled him. “We shall speak on this later.”

By this time, Legolas stood under the arched entrance to his father’s chamber, face steeled, teeth grit, but legs cemented in place. Elladan rushed to catch up, sweeping past the Mirkwood prince, through the mighty doors, and into the room itself, leaving no time for second-glances. Eldarion, trembling, fell back against his father, but Elrohir stepped valiantly forward, taking his kinsman by the arm and leading him, with small, measured steps, through the black threshold. 

At first sight of him, Legolas swayed, almost imperceptibly, but the elf-warrior held fast to him.

The once-golden King of the Mirkwood realm lay across the bed, like the flayed skins of a burst spore, mute, gaunt, skeletal. His anemic bones tented the stretched wax of his skin at the joints; what little flesh that remained pooled at the bottom of his limbs, like turned, globulous gelatin. His hair, the grimy white of mud-clumped snow, clung to his skull-cap scalp in natty, knotted patches, his elven crown like tinfoil. The rich-silked, cobalt splendor of his robes only underlined his rotted pallor, though their presence offered the onlookers a piercing reminder of the import of their decorum. 

Legolas, quaking almost imperceptibly, eyes glistening, slipped out of Elrohir’s grasp and strode boldly over to the bed. He knelt at Thranduil’s side, only then perceiving the tremulously faint signs of life still in the ancient King. 

“Ada,” Legolas whispered, barely able to find his breath. “I am returned.”

To everyone’s surprise, Thranduil’s black eyes widened, wandering over to take in his son’s troubled face. With inestimable effort, he lay a creaking hand over the prince’s. 

“Melethron…” 

“Eglerio le, Thranduil, Adar-nin,” Legolas intoned, his voice growing stronger. “Hiro le hîdh ab `wanath.“

“Be at peace, nin ind,” Thranduil comforted him. “Do not let my passing harness the wild spirit I have loved so well. Claim your freedom, nin bellas. Find your path through the green woods of this world. What news of the Glittering Caves? What of their beauty?”

“I have known it well, Ada,” Legolas responded. “Ten years I dwelt there.”

“And the aran Gondor? Is he well?”

“He is here to mourn you,” his son revealed. “He is here to see you home.” 

“And your brothers? Are they near?”

“They await you at Mandos,” Legolas reminded him, the hand over his turning to ice. “Rest now, Ada.”

“I will not rest until you have answered me, nin ind,” Thranduil insisted, his in-bred need to rule overtaking him. Legolas almost smiled. “Han bâd lin, melethron.”

“Dolen i vâd o nin, Ada.”

“Si peliannen i vâd na dail lîn. Si boe u-dhannathach, nin bellas,” Thranduil instructed, with learned patience.”You know of which I speak, Legolas.”

Caught suddenly in a wave of sorrow, the prince gripped his father’s hand. The Mirkwood king’s choked, rasping cough shook his entire being, rattling the joints as if shaken by a mighty tremor. Legolas clung to him, through the pain, then stroked a calming touch over his withered head. 

“I would not keep you further,” the prince solemnly ventured. “I Aear cân le ‘Namar’. I chair gwannar na Mandos. Si bado, no círar. Gerich veleth nîn, Ada.”

“Gerich veleth nin, Legolas,” Thranduil pledged, even as his black eyes caught their last glimmer of the world. His heavy lids closed shut, their last sight the golden brilliance of his son and heir. 

Legolas opened his mouth, to sing for him, but his voice was lost. Not a whisper, not a sound, not a moan could he utter, such was his sorrow. His brave, unwavering eyes gave in to his grief, the tears spilling over his desolate face, his sallow cheeks. 

“*Ada*,” he cried, bowing his head to the King’s frigid hand, still clasped tightly in his own. 

The company was frozen, bereft. They watched the faithful prince grieve for his father, grappling to keep hold, the sight helplessly overwhelming. Aragorn knelt, to pay tribute to the King’s passing, Eldarion quickly followed suit, as did Elladan. 

Elrohir, however, trod noiselessly over to the sobbing prince’s side, laying two steady, tender hands on his quaking shoulders. With a whispered prayer to the Valar, he softly began to sing a hallowed hymn of mourning. Elladan soon followed his brother, joining him in song. Aragorn and Eldarion stood at attention, immovable, honoring their Eldar brethren.

After several moments, Legolas found his voice, his strength anew. 

He sang more beautifully than ever before. 

 

 

Elvish phrases:

/Eglerio le, Thranduil, Adar-nin./ Glorify him, Thranduil, my father.

/Hiro le hîdh ab `wanath./ May you find peace after death.

/Han bâd lin, melethron./ This is your path, beloved.

/Dolen i vâd o nin, Ada./ My path is hidden from me, Father. 

/Si peliannen i vâd na dail lîn. Si boe ú-dhannathach, nin bellas./ It is already laid before your feet. You cannot falter now, my strength.

/I Aear cân le «Namar». I chair gwannar na Mandos. Si bado, no círar. Gerich veleth nîn, Ada./ The Sea calls you “Farewell”. The ship is leaving for Mandos. Go now, before it is too late. You have my love, Father.

/Gerich veleth nin, Legolas./ You have my love, Legolas.

/Ada/ Father

/Nin ind/ My heart

/Nin bellas/ My strength


	3. Faeg

/Seeing that I stand unwon, however wooed,  
And rend the garment of my life, in brief,  
By a most dauntless, voiceless fortitude,  
Lest one touch of this heart convey its grief./ 

His cool, cerulean eyes swept over the view of the black bow-houses, the sagging branches, the cinder-scarred earth far below his high-bourn balcony, the moon-less night that surrounded him. 

The ruins of his kingdom. 

Clothed in nothing but sweat, saliva, and the slick wash of the peredhil’s seed, spent thickly across the puckering skin of his abdomen, Legolas met the callow midnight with craven eyes. Despite Elrohir’s eager compliance to every perversion of his dark needs, despite hours of burning deep into his war-brother with brutal, un-balmed thrusts, a parasitic restlessness bit into the seams of his spine. 

In the room behind, the Imladrian prince lay cocooned in slow-drying sheets, laced, Legolas forced himself to be reminded, with his own blood. The dull, musty breeze encrusted similar stains to the archer’s own swollen thighs, his legs and his loins well-brazed by their roughness. He could not bring himself to regret what had passed between them, nor did he believe Elrohir to be sunk in else but a peaceful slumber; still, the ease with which he’d overtaken his companion, so often gentled by their Rites, had shaken him. / I claim the Rites of mourning, yet it is he who cleaves. And I, in turn, punish./ 

As suddenly as a spooked stallion, Legolas reared his head, the flaxen waves of his loose hair rippling behind like a banner. He crept stealthily back into his chamber. He collected the elf-warrior’s fallen sarong from the hide before the hearth, expertly wrapping the plush indigo velour around his solid waistline. His slender hipbones pushed up, over the woven edge, as he padded carefully to the bed. For several moments, he stood observing the somnambulant elf for any signs of distress, then slowly bent over him to suckle, rather sweetly, at the nape of his neck. A warming hand brushed tenderly over the body he had rode so well, assuring the Mirkwood prince that the lax form was tucked-in tight. 

Sure in this, he left him. 

The hollow gloom of the archways and the stairwells failed to disquiet one so familiar with their elegant geometry. Many nights had the prince stolen down these very passageways, a blithe streak oft mistaken for moonlight, in the early years of his adolescent escapades, to rendezvous with, or to expertly avoid, a covetous admirer. A fortnight since his father’s passing, this thought brought the first smile to his sinuous lips in that mournful span of time. The momentary urge to return to his chamber and rouse his sated bedfellow with a thick-tongued penitent’s kiss threatened, but he held to his path. 

The kitchens beckoned mercilessly. 

A solitary candle flickered in the heart of the massive wooden carving table. In the fire-bricked hearths hung pregnant pewter cauldrons, the walls adorned with glinting racks of huge copper pots, quicksilver knives, lava-black ladles, and trunk-fat spits. To his raucous stomach’s relief, he found a veritable midnight feast laid out for him: spitting-hot soup, fresh breads, cold meats, dwarf-churned cheese (a distinct preference over those Shire curds the halflings chomp so gleefully), and a veritable trough of mead. 

Before he could praise Elbereth for his culinary fortune, however, a hand rested on his shoulder. 

“Mae govannen, mellon-nîn,” Aragorn greeted him wryly, an arched eyebrow silently remarking on the elf’s wanton appearance. “I see your hunger has returned.” 

“Indeed, it has,” Legolas replied, with an ambiguity of meaning, as he cast his eyes once more over the awaiting meal. “Could I bear upon your grace to share your supper?”

“With pleasure.” The King gestured him towards a place at the table. 

As his friend watched on, his slate-blue eyes amused, benevolent, protective, the archer devoured every last morsel of the hearty meal, more nourishment in this one sitting than he had consumed in a month’s time. Aragorn chose to sip leisurely at his soup, relieved at the progress his bereaved friend was showing, both in his brazenly immodest appearance and in his zestful, near-relentless appetite. Perhaps, at last, he is mended. 

After Legolas wiped the last of the mead-froth from his mouth, the King allowed himself a booming chuckle. The elf smirked, bashful, and laid a firm hand over the adan’s own. 

“My thanks for every breath of your kindness. It has consoled me well.”

“I have missed your company these last days,” Aragorn generously stated. “I have been pained to see you so… solemn.” Legolas nodded, thoughts of the past fortnight’s shadows dulling the gleam of his fair features. “Yet you have admirably bested the trials of grief.”

“Bested them, yes,” the prince conceded. “But they are not yet conquered.” Trembling, he withdrew his silken palm, sinking further into the hard wood of his seat. “Let us speak of light matters. The Queen tells me she is yet again with child.”

The King let out a helpless mewl, then settled his face into a fond, mischievous smile.

“*Indeed*,” he mused. “She made no note of it before our departure.” He considered this a moment, then laughed at himself. “But I am glad of it. Another treasure. We are blessed.” 

“With potency, some may say,” the archer teased. 

“Aye, I will not counter you,” the King gladly accepted the ruse. “Though I will allow that it is the quality of our love that proves our family so…peopled. When one is enthralled in such raptures as ours, every chance to make that blissful connection is… crucial. Indispensable. Essential.”

At this, the prince fell pensive. “Your love… is an example to us all.”

Aragorn smirked ruefully. “What do you know of love? In this, your heart is chaste as a Shire-ling on the eve of her wedding day.” 

“Aye,” he faintly responded, his earlier spark now smote entirely. “I am not fit for it.”

With a hawkish glare, the King steadily observed his elf-brother, noting both his tone of dissatisfaction and his implied self-berating. The heathen seeds of Thranduil’s demise had grown, weaving taut, sickly vines over the prince’s celebrin spirit. Aragorn folded his fingers together, in a gesture of self-restraint, and laid them on his lap. All may not yet be lost.

“Mellon-nîn,” he began. “I would not burden you further in such a sorrowful time. However… a matter has arisen of which both Elladan and I myself feel you must be appraised, without delay.” 

The prince’s dagger-keen stare sprang up to meet the King’s own. “What matter is this?”

Aragorn withheld his reply a moment, his eventual words explicitly cautious. “The day of the Warg attack in the woods, the day we arrived here, did you not note a… a weakening of Elrohir’s skills. After the battle, he seemed disoriented, short of breath… when even my son was not.”

“The woods affected him deeply.” Legolas leapt to his defense. “It is the nature of our kind. I, too, heard their cries, but it compelled me into fury. Elrohir… felt the woods differently than I. It was no weakness, Aragorn.”

“There have been other moments,” Aragorn gently insisted. “Other… signs.” 

Legolas turned his face away, shut his eyes. The weight of his gorgings forged to lead in the bowels of his being, their bilious fumes swelling, searing in his throat. With far too capable ease, his mind marked the sum of a dozen fell moments, where the archer had excused away the half-elven’s fatigue and inaccuracy with a callow thought to his mixed heritage. 

“He fades, gwanur-nîn,” Aragorn murmured, but firmly. The warrior reached across the table, gripping a solid, steady hand over the archer’s own. “Elladan, in his twinness, has felt its grip. He’s felt the chill pass through his heart, when you… when you have denied his brother, these few weeks past…”

“I mourned my father!!” Legolas cried suddenly; whether from anger or sorrow, Aragorn could not know. “I *grieved*, as an elf truly grieves, for an ageless, honorable love. Not one so quickly found, born out of… foolish reverie.”

“Do you judge Elrohir’s heart foolish?” Aragorn growled, his temper rising. “Easily conquered?”

Legolas bowed his head. The calloused skin of his fingers, his branded thighs, the purpled backs of his forceful legs, and the blood-crusted scars across his shoulder blades, hidden by his sheath of hair, bore witness to the elf-warrior’s ravishing, at his willfully ignorant hands. 

“I *do* judge it so if he fades for love of one so… so hollow and base as myself.” 

“*Legolas*…” The King’s shoulders sank, his anger extinguished by such dispirited words. 

Sensing his friend’s coming argument, Legolas quickly added: “I speak right, Aragorn. One who’s heart is cold, as mine, can never be worthy of the devotion of such… such a valiant, tender soul. I know myself. I know… my ways.” The archer swallowed back another corrosive mouthful of bile, the memory of grayed, pleading eyes in his doorway, of gut-core wails at the *height* of their meeting, of an iron hand clamped over the elf-warrior’s throat nearly besting him. He held fast. 

“I cannot save him,” he decreed, in a strangled whisper. 

Aragorn rose to full imposition, his face shroud in blackness. 

“Then break with him,” he near-commanded, his chest heaving with barely-kept rage. “With Elrond’s care, and his twin brother’s strength, there may still be a chance to save him. He may not be… without hope.” 

This, above all else, brought new color to the prince’s ashen cheeks. 

“He may be saved?!” Legolas asked, desperation and relief mingling within. 

“He may,” the King replied, with a fierce solemnity. “He may die. Over years of relentless agony and the soul’s fiendish torments. As your father did, forlorn King of Mirkwood. Forsaking Valinor, the gift of eternity, and the Middle-Earth you both cherish so well.” Aragorn lifted his head to the light, his noble breadth as imposing as the tower of Barad-dûr. “His valiant, tender heart burnt to cinder. As did your green wood, under dragon’s breath, son of Thranduil.”

With that, the King kicked back his chair, leaving Legolas to stew. 

***********************

Elrohir shivered, once, then stirred. 

The dawn had risen, wan and weary over the fog-plagued haunts of this hollowed Mirkwood. From the cloying sheets of its prince’s bed, the elf-warrior’s drowsy gaze could barely perceive the sugary peaks of the mountains to the south, their pale cast whitewashed into the cool, static morning haze. His body’s length felt similarly vapid, as if he’d dueled to ravaging the evening past, yet the wounds, once struck, balmed and mended by unseen, gracious hands. 

Before Elrohir had occasion to examine himself, Legolas returned. Though he had not bothered to cleanse himself of the remains of their coupling, the prince’s manner betrayed no evidence of the previous night’s ardor. The burnished orbs of his cerulean eyes hung low, glazed and mirthless. He shed the sagging sarong without care, though his mind was clearly engaged in some further sorrowful contemplation, most which Elrohir had thought charred to dust in their passion. 

Despite his obvious preoccupation, the archer deposited a tray on the bed-table: a steaming pitcher of cream, a bowl of fortifying oats speckled with dried berries and fresh apple shards, a cup of herbal tea, and cimmeg root for seasoning. When he turned to his bedfellow, his face resumed a mask of studied calm. /Even in life, he shields and wields with a warrior’s poise./

Legolas perched on the edge of the bed, ably mixing their breakfast. The elf-warrior tucked a tight grip into the seam of his thigh. 

“Have you taken your rest, my brave one?”

“Some,” came the murky reply. 

“I have been gluttonous with sleep,” Elrohir smirked wryly. He curled up to the prince’s flexed leg with a panther’s feral grace, his flint-eyes darkened a cool indigo, darting perilously down the length of his bare chest. “I am hungry for… the day.” 

The archer rose with a start, when the rough texture of the peredhil’s salmon pink tongue lapped over the taut skin of his kneecap. Despite his reactionary skills, his lap was summarily doused with thick, warm cream. Though Legolas stood, aghast, glaring, the Imladrian prince was soon beside himself with laughter. 

The archer’s rage and shame burned as hot as his resulting arousal. 

“Come, maltaren-nîn,” Elrohir beckoned, his mirth quenched by the flood of desire. “You are betrayed, and burning. Let me-“ The archer snatched his hand away in a fierce, crushing grip.

“Do you think me so base? So wanton?” Legolas seethed, his eyes ablaze. “I had gone twenty years without another’s touch.”

“And you wither at mine,” Elrohir retorted, emboldened by this challenge. His steadfast warrior’s heart suddenly buckled, heaved, pumping icy swells through his veins. Headstrong, he kept on. “You have suffered greatly these last months, calenlass, and for that I will forgive this insolence. But it is ungracious to spit in the face of one who just this last night bore the dagger’s edge of your need without grievance, with nary a cry in protest.” 

Fingers of searing frost clamped around his throat, choking off these last few words. Elrohir bit down tight, desperate to suck back his dry, wheezing coughs, but this prideful struggle only wrought the salty sting of tears. 

Before he could strike-out in protest, he was shroud in the soothing heat of the prince’s arms. 

“Edhored, mellon-nîn. Im faeg. Im faeg.” Legolas repeatedly murmured into his tousled hair, fearful, mauling hands rediscovering their form in his bruises. “Tolo dan na ngalad.”

As the Imladrian prince’s breaths grew long and full, both of the Eldar fought to remain centered. For several tense moments, Legolas held his ailing elf-brother, ever-conscious of the healing effects of his iron-lock grip. Elrohir, for his part, felt his body surge with energy, enough to flip the archer onto his back and jab the butter knife to the soft of his slender throat. 

The menace of this thought alone chastened him. 

/What has become of me?/ Both elves demanded of themselves. 

Elrohir wrenched himself away, sprang to his feet. Still, he remained at the bedside. He heard Legolas gather the sheets, wipe the remnants of the now-cold cream away. A cup was raised, tea haltingly sipped. A dull lethargy few would mistake for calm seeped through him. 

“In the spirit of our Rites, gwanur-nîn,” the Mirkwood prince dared to whisper. “May I charge you with a most… exceptional task?” When the elf-warrior hesitated, Legolas pressed cautiously on. “Are you still sworn to aid me in this journey?”

“I am,” smacked the reply. 

“I am glad of it,” Legolas added, before confronting the meat of the matter. “I would that your father be warned in advance of our coming. Of the nature, if you will, of our grave purpose. The fellowship is set to depart under cover of night. I ask that you ride out, this very hour, for Imladris, and bear message to your father. Your brother and I have both composed letters, for your charge.” He heard the archer rise, at last, and come towards him. “You will reach Imladris vital days before our arrival, if you ride swiftly. As I know you can.” 

Brashly, the elf-warrior turned on his heel, the sheer force of his hawkish stare striking true. 

“You would be rid of me.”

“I would your father be warned of such black tidings.”

“And who will bear the black yearnings of your heart while I am gone?” Elrohir retorted. “My brother? The King? The young prince?”

“I will bear them alone,” Legolas countered, but without his typical bite. “As always.”

This last slashed through the elf-warrior as quick and as deep as the blade of an Uruk-hai, though he bravely bore the brunt of it. 

“I am charged,” he stated firmly, bowing his head. “I will ride within the hour.” 

Legolas, his guilt gutting him through, raised his head to lock eyes with his elf-brother.

“But mark this, maltaren-nîn, for rare is the day I am so lamely overthrown,” Elrohir continued. “No matter the nature of the battle, or the other’s fearsome size…”

His eyes, black as midnight, slit into the archer’s own.

“You will never stand alone.”

 

A/N: Elvish phrases

/Edhored, mellon-nîn. Im faeg. Im faeg./ Forgive me, my friend. I am weak. I am weak.

/Tolo dan na ngalad./ Come back into the light.

/Maltaren-nîn./ My golden prince.


	4. Eglerio

‘I did not wrong myself so, but I placed   
A wrong on thee. For perfect strains may float  
‘Neath masters hands, from instruments defaced,-  
And great souls, at one stroke, may do and doat.’ 

With gray eyes as hard as forged hearthstone and a scowl creased as deep as the bark of Fangorn forest, Elrond peered across the Imladrian valley at the procession edging along the eastern ridge. Their blithe, reverent voices had announced them hours before; Rivendell’s well-selected acoustic position, among the foothills of the Misty Mountains, shepherding their glorified tones through the house of the High Elven. 

Sage Glorfindel ever by his side, Elrond had observed the gaining progress of the mourners for the larger part of the morning. The immaculate verse and tremulous beauty of elven funeral dirges, though sorrowful, had ever captivated him. Though he knew the days to come would be long, and the road to true serenity burdensome, he drew what solace he could from both the strength of Glorfindel’s tender arms and the grave magnificence of the hallowed voices: his grandson’s unsullied soprano, the archer’s ravaged alto, his son’s lush tenor, and the King’s wearied bass. 

As the golden balm of sunlight spread over the valley’s scope, the fellowship crept along the path to the grand stone archway of Imladris. When the singing was of such intensity as to wring tears from the cobalt eyes of his fierce, beloved Glorfindel, Elrond began his descent to the courtyard. 

There, his keen stare had occasion to observe the slow-moving procession unseen. Momentarily distracted by his eloquent grandson’s resemblance to the Lady Evenstar, he was nevertheless quick to note Estel’s well-guarded frustration, as well as his Elladan’s barely-veiled concern. The Mirkwood prince, however, bore the brunt of his cruel glare. 

Merely hours before, their rest had been disrupted by the arrival of his second son; or rather, a horse carrying a ghostly pale, feverish, near-delirious shell of what had formerly been his brash, foreboding Elrohir, endlessly bleating his own miserable dirge. 

/Calenlass, maltaren-nin, calenlass…/

Even from such foliage-shroud vantage, Elrond saw the Mirkwood prince’s shame clear as the flow of the Bruinen below. For one so fearless, he, too, was much altered by a different grief, his stance couched, his skin waxen, his eyes, normally the soul of mischief, haunted. Though his letter had detailed the saga of his son’s unraveling, they spoke little of the tale the archer’s own face told: starvation, flagellation, bereavement of such intensity as to easily vanquish even the most stalwart of elven hearts. Whereas, before their arrival, Elrond had thought the prince fit to be flayed alive; upon witnessing the state of his despair, the High Eldar knew he had judged him too harshly. 

The realization did little to quell the rages of a father’s heart. 

With Glorfindel steadfast at his side, Elrond tread down, into the courtyard.

“Mae govannen,” he solemnly welcomed them. Before any formal greetings could be heard, his grandson flew into his arms. 

“Ada!!” Eldarion exclaimed with undisguised glee. Elrond clung to the bristling youth, his weathered face softening. 

“Eldarion!!” The King swiftly reprimanded. “Is this the courtesy you show the Lord of Imladris?”

“Welcome, pen-neth,” Elrond murmured to the youth, who dutifully ignored his father and gazed with unblemished awe into the worn eyes of his elder. Elrond, too-easily recalling the regal blue twinkle of a similarly disobedient, angelic child, soon tempered him. “There is no need of courtesy here, melethron-nîn. This is your home.” 

Elrond reluctantly passed his daughter’s son off to Glorfindel, opening his mighty arms to embrace his foster son. 

“Suilad, Estel-nîn,” Elrond sung heartily. “I fear we will need your renewing strength, before long. These are dark days.”

“Indeed, father,” Aragorn sighed, his look telling the tale of their journey’s trials. 

After a passing greeting to Elladan, who left to ride the casket into sanctuary at the Last Homely House, Elrond turned to the last of their company. 

“Mae govannen, Legolas Thranduilion,” he decreed, perhaps more incisively than even he intended. 

`Lord Elrond,” Legolas intoned with difficulty. The eyes that met the High Elf’s were purpled with pernicious anxiety. 

“I have received your correspondence,” Elrond continued. “And bring news from the High Council. The King of Mirkwood shall be sheathed in the Eternal Flame at the coming dawn, and the matter of the Green Wood will be heard a week hence.”

“I am grateful for the Council’s regard in this matter,” Legolas thanked him dully. “And may I ask… after the messenger…?”

Elrond cleared his throat, the memory of his fading son’s appearance still closely held. 

“Yes,” Aragorn questioned outright. “How fares Elrohir? Elladan held… some concern.”

“He arrived but hours ago,” Elrond began. 

“Hours?!” Aragorn pounced, shooting a glare at his elf-brother. “But with his speed, he should have bested us by three days time, at the least!!” 

“Aye,” Elrond rasped, his voice abandoning him. He forced resolve. “I am astonished that he was not lost entirely. He arrived… frayed, incensed… raving, even… I fear it will not be long, if another is not found…” 

At this pronouncement, Legolas could visibly be seen to wither. 

“Ada,” Aragorn implored him, the finality of the situation taking hold. “Is there nothing to be done?” 

Elrond bowed his head, too proud to have his foster son witness his acceptance of defeat. 

“I know of no remedy, Estel, that can mend a broken heart.” 

With that, Elrond swiftly turned to lead the journeymen into his home. Eager for further news of Elrohir, the King followed him.

Legolas, with heavy conscience, followed thereafter. 

* * *

The yellow tongues of the Eternal Flame lapped over the edges of the casket of fine carved Mirkwood oak, as the dawn blushed through the willow branches that surrounded the clearing at Imladris. The flames melted through the cherrywine stain, charring the scenes of Silvan victory, of the hallowed Valar, and of the King’s own woodland realm engraved within. Circled around the raging pyre, the assembled elves chanted piously, their low-sung hymns reverberating through the billowing leaves around them. 

Legolas, steady, near-entranced, stood at the head of the blaze, Aragorn close at his side. He stood, unmoving, as the logs crumbled to ash, as the walls of the casket collapsed, as his father’s flesh was sucked from his very bones by the all-consuming flames, those then melted to coal-black dust. He stood as his kinsmen sung of the days of ages past, of elves felled by the fading grief, of loves lost and won again, of ageless eternity in the Hall of Mandos, the Havens in the Western sea, of Valinor. 

He lifted his eyes but once, on instinct, to stare through the flames, the smoke, at the shadowed path leading up to the Last Homely House. There, a figure he at first mistook for the very ghost of his father awaited him, the hushed indigo of his eyes beckoning, their cast pale, but striking deep. The peredhil loomed, shroud in the violets and blues of a warrior’s ceremonial garb, the sheen of his long, wild hair as black as the coal-cinder. 

The prince of Mirkwood raised his eyes but once, when the haunting figure began to sing. 

It was a song unlike any other the assembled elves had heard before, lush, longing, as if Elbereth herself had given it voice. Even as the figure descended into the clearing, his every movement hung as if by the weight of a dozen stone pillars, he sang true, with sweeping breaths of bleak, reverent devastation. The figure joined the circle; the prince lowered his gaze into the thick of the crackling pyre. 

The elven warriors grieved for the fallen king. 

* * * 

“I am well, Ada!!” Elrohir bellowed, overturning the bowl of broth, the fresh washing, and a fine silver carafe with one fail swoop of his walking-stick. “I will not be held in this… this *dungeon* a day longer!!” 

His mouth soured into a scowl, the prince lumbered over to the oval eye of the window and peered down into the valley below. There, Erestor prepared the horses for a hunting party, Glorfindel and Aragorn took a leisurely stroll, and Eldarion made his way to the archery fields, struggling with his new bow, a gift from his presently bemused grandfather. 

“True, your progress has been remarkable,” Elrond argued, with practiced diplomacy. “But you are not yet fully recovered. The slightest upset could arrest this current remission, which may–“

“I must see him, Ada,” Elrohir cut straight to the heart. “Any progress I have made will be for naught should I wither at the least sight of him.”

“You are still too weak, my elf-knight,” Elrond noted, a tremor of fear creeping into his voice. His son may have been plagued by feverish delirium at the time, but the Lord of Imladris recalled all too vividly the long nights he’d spent nursing him as best he knew how, helpless to soothe the body that shook to breaking at the slightest breeze, that shrank painfully away from even the softest touch. “So named for the iron will that proved necessary to survive your very birth into this world!! I have born witness time and again to your valor, nin bellas, but should the grief strike you anew…”

Elrohir turned himself from the pastoral splendor of the view, sighed. His tempered gaze rested on the wearied face of his learned father, the usual elven tranquility of his features now scored with barely-disguised agony. Elrond’s gray eyes were flecked with five separate hues of silver; a sure sign of the sea’s maiden call. 

With bitter irony, the elf-warrior noted that his father was only being kept from sailing West by the High Council deliberations over the Mirkwood prince’s destiny, and perhaps his own grave plight. While he recognized the inherent dangers in seeing Legolas again, what his father could not- could never- know was that his death-hour pledge to the Mirkwood prince was the only thing that kept him well. 

Mere days before, as the peerless light of the great Halls of Mandos cradled him from above, he’d heard the elven chorus around Thranduil’s pyre. In the very moment of his passing, as his own eternal flame was but a fuming pile of cinder, he was blessed with a moment of lucidity. Hours praying to the Valar had taught him to forage for these stolen moments. His devout practices helped him cling to his Middle-Earth, grasp hold, once again, of the sage elven life, and force his spirit to rise, like the phoenix, not from the ash, but from his ashen deathbed. 

If he passed, as the Mirkwood king, his fair prince’s heart would indeed turn to stone. Elrohir had sworn to stand by him. He had sworn a warrior’s pledge to sing for the fallen king. He’d rode, at his own peril, for three torturous weeks at the prince’s misguided word. As he stared across the blazing casket into Legolas’ ice-blue eyes, he knew the greatest battle of his life was yet to come, that he was no soldier at all, should victory elude him. He would not allow the archer’s pride, fear, and self-loathing to conquer him. He would not condemn his mule-headed maltaren to a Valinorian eternity without ever knowing the bliss of love. 

He would fight this from his last, to the last.

After the funeral, the mighty elf-warrior had made his recovery through sheer force of will; that, and his knowledge of the prince’s love for him, held captive in the core of his being, kept him on the narrow path to serenity. 

“He will seek you out,” Elrond underlined with finality. “He will not see his error until you have grown cold and fallen, until all is lost.”

Yet his father knew none of this, and thus judged Legolas a danger to him. 

“*Ada*,” Elrohir cooed, shuffling patiently over to take his hands. “A compromise?”

Elrond raised a pointed, shrewd brow. “What mischief is this?”

“Legolas leaves soon for the hunt,” the prince essayed, with near-Elrondian rationality. “I will observe their departure from the window. Stay at my side. Should I suffer from this vision, I will remain in this very chamber for an entire fortnight, sipping broth and reading The Hobbit’s Tale.”

Elrond’s eyes darkened. “You mock me.”

“I do,” his son admitted, not without the afore-blamed mischief. 

“Yet there is wisdom in this,” the anxious father reluctantly admitted. “Come. The hunters shall be departing soon.” 

With a pleased smile, Elrohir took his father’s arm and allowed himself to be guided back to the oval window. Below, a small party of elves had gathered, the Mirkwood prince not yet among their ranks.

“What is their charge, Ada?”

“A dozen or so quintail, mossfield boar, and, pray Elbereth, an oxreeth,” Elrond informed him. “There will soon be feasting in our halls.”

“What feast is this?”

Elrond paused, suddenly, caught in a trap of his own devising. 

“A coronation,” Elrond dismissed. 

“A coronation?” Elrohir repeated confusedly. “But who is to be…” The answer struck him. 

Elrohir swallowed hard, shut his eyes. His focus turned inward, towards his own eternal flame, which had begun to flicker. He thought of Legolas, alone, bereft, among the remains of his once-green forest, each trunk as hard and gray as a tombstone, upon his head a spiked crown of withered rosebush vines. He felt a surge of empathy, of compassion, and grasped hold. He poured this energy into the blue of the flame, into that hot, scorching center, until he felt its warmth flow through him. 

All this transpired, unnoticed, under Elrond’s rapt examination. 

“But Mirkwood has fallen to shadow,” Elrohir commented, as if not a thing were amiss. 

“The Council is yet uncertain as to the location of his kingdom,” came the enigmatic reply, ever-conscious of the strain such talk provoked. 

“I see.” The elf-warrior nodded patiently, but remained thoroughly confused as to the ways of the Council’s often eccentric logic. 

“*I* see the hunting party is poised for departure,” Elrond insinuated with satisfaction. “And Legolas is surely not among them.”

“He is often tardy. He is meticulous in his preparations.”

“He is never tardy,” Elrond all but decreed. “Though I have known him to be well-prepared.” 

Elrohir stifled a snort of exasperation, as he watched the riders charge into the eastern woods, not a flaxen sheath of hair among them. 

“Shall I have Irthiesien, in the library, seek out The Hobbit’s Tale?” Elrond queried mirthfully. The prince turned to glower at his father, but met with a surprisingly lenient gaze. “Or shall I fetch your brother, for a stroll by the archery fields? The young prince of Gondor has himself suffered more than a few sleepless nights at your expense. I cannot think how a *brief* lesson would be other than wondrously restorative to you both.”

With that generous proclamation, Elrond left his cherished elf-knight to his own wondering, at the even-handed benevolence of his father’s rule. 

* * * 

With knowing, nimble fingers, the archer knotted the prickly tips of the sap-treated horse hair, then fed the opposite end through both of the silver bow’s eyes. Weaving the elastic strand into his careful grasp, he searched, with a tuner’s ear, for the right tension. As he expertly completed the re-stringing, he lifted his cerulean eyes to meet Eldarion’s attentive stare. The task complete, he plucked the bow like a minstrel’s harp.

“Do you hear?” Legolas inquired of his student. “She sings true.“ 

“You are a master,” the youth near-gasped.

“I am merely the veteran of a noble quest,” the Mirkwood prince replied humbly. “The Valar’s light would hardly be well-served by an archer who could not re-string his bow in the heat of battle.” The young Eldar paused to admire his work. “Shall we test her?”

Eldarion’s eyes sparked with delight. 

The archer rose, shrugged on his quiver, then, as he strode towards the chalk marking that delineated the minimal distance for a practitioner’s stance, fired off a constant, deadly accurate stream of arrows into the center of the target. With nary a smirk of self-satisfaction, he offered the bow to the gape-mouthed princeling. 

“She is steady,” he appraised. “A fine instrument. Will you try her?” 

“I c-cannot best you,” the youth stuttered.

“But you are well-schooled,” Legolas protested. “I do not ask that you best me, merely that you strike the center ring of the target. This distance is of elven measure. Even your father, with his great skill, finds it troublesome.”

“Though he would rather be skinned alive by a coven of brew-drunk witch maidens,” a familiar voice announced, as a cloaked figure limped away from the cover of the trees. “Than admit to any weakness in weaponry skill, or in any other thing.” 

“Saitë,” Eldarion cried, then dashed over to greet his hobbled master. As the Gondorian prince crushed into him, Elrohir chuckled fondly and lowered the hood of his burgundy cloak. “You are well again.”

He beamed a supple, violet gaze at the dumbstruck archer, who struggled to maintain his composure. 

“I am healing,” the peredhil amended, scruffing his lean fingers through the youth’s ebony curls. “Adar thought a turn out of doors would replenish me. I am too long in the dark. I recover, yet I remain pale as a ghost.” The elf-warrior noted Legolas’ visible shudder at that pronouncement. “He had charged Elladan to watch over me… but the Loremaster of Imladris, as you may know, is easily distracted. It was little trouble to steal down here to see you.” 

“I am glad of your deception,” Eldarion whispered to him. “I longed for word of your progress, but father would not heed me. I feared the worst.” 

“Ah, fathers,” Elrohir grinned down at him. “Such troublesome creatures.” At the youth’s complicit giggle, the darkling elf was quick to surreptitiously add: “Much as Mirkwood archers.” 

The prince of Gondor coughed out a laugh, then guided his ailing guardian to a nearby log. 

“Come Saitë,” Eldarion remarked. “You will help me master this elven track.”

The prince of Mirkwood stood stalk-still throughout this exchange, the sight of his elf-brother restored halting him to near-paralysis. The elf-warrior was no longer of a warrior’s build. The sickness had well-feasted on his meaty frame, gorging itself on what little swell, paunch, and gristle there was to be found. The languorously elegant figure proved far more elven in his new, lissome grace. Though his slender limbs hung with fatigue, the sharper angles of his face gentled his once-rapacious regard, almost sweetening his features to an ethereal delicacy. 

The archer’s dormant heart began to simmer in its rib-caged berth, the resulting flood through his brittle veins vertiginous. He lurched back, dizzy, as Eldarion sped past, struggling to regain his focus. He aimed his swimming attention at the youth, at the target, applauding limply when the arrows struck true. 

He nearly swooned when a cool hand pressed into the small of his back. 

“You have sharpened his instincts,” Elrohir complimented warmly. “As I could not have. He is better for it.”

Oblivious to the youth’s continued demonstration, the Mirkwood prince met the peredhil’s patient, open gaze with bleary eyes. He raise his hands, brushing tense, tremulous fingers down the slope of the elf-warrior’s sunken cheek. 

“You are not…” he barely exhaled, his voice tight, ragged. “I have not…”

“Legolas,” Elrohir cooed. He reached up, tenderly stroking soothing hands down the back length of the archer’s neck, over his stiff shoulders. “You are not to blame for what has befallen me. I did not heed your warnings. I felt myself… invincible. A grave mistake…”

“A warrior’s mistake,” the prince echoed, though the words were despairing. “A valiant error, gwanur-nîn.” Suddenly struck by the truth of the sight before him, Legolas released a groan of emphatic relief. He threw his arms around the elf-warrior, almost winding him in his ardor. “You are healed, Elrohir. *Healed*…” 

As the darkling elf’s weary grasp wove around his waist, a chilling thought assaulted the Mirkwood prince’s respite. The only possible reason his elf-brother could be so renewed. An unknown desolation sunk its teeth down to his very bones, as he shrank away from the peredhil, struggling to maintain composure.

“You have found another,” Legolas barely murmured, as he tore his gleaming eyes away from the other’s consoling gaze. “You have been bound…”

Before Elrohir’s tired arms could grab him, the archer began his retreat. 

“Legolas,” the elf-warrior beckoned, now too weak to follow him. “*No*…” 

“I am glad of it,” the maltaren answered harshly back, not understanding why tears sprang from his wounded eyes, why his shoulders quaked so. His only thought was of the river, of a water-shroud sanctuary he’d often sought in days past. “It is rightly thus.”

By the time Elrohir gathered breath to call him, the forest had swallowed him up.

 

 

A/N: 

‘Saitë’ Quenya word for teacher

‘Maltaren’ Golden Prince


	5. Dago Hon

/‘The first time that the sun rose on thine oath  
To love me, I looked forward to the moon  
To slacken all those bonds which seemed too soon  
And quickly tied to make a lasting troath.  
Quick-loving hearts, I thought, may quickly loathe;  
And, looking on myself, I seemed not one  
For such man’s love!’/

As the thunderous swells of the Loudwater swept over the mossy growth of the riverbed, down from the Misty Mountains through the valley of Rivendell, Legolas dove, as ably as a freshwater minnow, into the current. His bowsman’s arms ripped into the clear, blue waters of the Bruinen, propelling him further through the gauzy shafts of sunlight that beamed down into the depths, a labyrinth of amber stakes. 

He swam rapidly, furiously, as if the very tide would suck him down as into the Dead Marshes. With a last, powerful kick, he emerged in the shadow of a flat-topped rock, then hoisted himself onto the well-baked surface. As breathless, and as breathtaking, as the mermen of legends past, the Mirkwood prince stretched out across the coarse stone, his sheathes of sodden hair clinging to his bare torso, his green leggings matted, like seaweed, to his limber legs. 

Only then did he release a long, charged breath.

He dipped his fingers over the edge, into the cooling river. Without the shade of the sweeping willow branches and the lush oak leaves that guarded the green spaces of Imladris, the sun’s sweltering rays seared into his skin, the pure heat an unrelenting assailant. The lucid blast of his blood-pump crashed through him still, flooding his bewildered mind with gushes of foreign, unwelcome feeling. With a blunt thud, his head fell back, the burden of resolution too weighty for his assaulted body to support. 

/Like a coward, I fled. At the crux of it, when he sought me out, I flew as a startled doe into the woods…/

His shame scorched as hot as the sun. His unsteady gaze wandered up, into the immaculate sky, and he thought of his people, in Valinor. 

/Perhaps this strangeness is nothing but the Sea’s call. Perhaps the Valar summon me./ 

His throat dry, the lie was bitter in his mouth, painfully swallowed. His senses still grotesquely acute, buzzing around him like a deranged swarm, the Mirkwood prince dared not move, least the cacophony intensify. He felt sick one moment, giddy the next. This condition infected his every thought, his every motion, until he dug his nails into the scarring rock and growled a curse at the sky. 

“Give me peace!!” he roared, but was silenced by a nearby splash. He bolted up, raptly surveying his surroundings, then paid the price when the nausea returned with a vengeance. /Will nothing quell this insidious fury?/ 

Before long, Aragorn’s sopping arms splattered over the rock’s edge, as he yanked up his hulking frame, in full hunting gear. 

“I heard your cry,” he announced himself. “Even on the plain of Gorgoroth, I did not heard such violent words pass your lips, mellon-nîn. What has befallen you?”

“I know not,” Legolas bleated morosely, suddenly stricken by a wave of sorrow. “I am not… unwell, nor weak, yet my heart rages like a throng of Rohirrim. I sweat, yet I shiver still, my mind is a fog… I cannot quench this rapacious thirst, this… *longing*…”

“For what do you long?” Aragorn asked quietly, yet even as he posed the question, he suspected the answer elusive. To the Mirkwood prince, at the least.

Indeed, Legolas could not form a proper reply. His stare soon betrayed him, drifting off towards the distant archery fields. The King’s stealthy eyes soon traced the same path, catching sight of Eldarion and… /could it be?/ 

In the fashion of an oft-burdened ruler, Aragorn grew pensive. Though scarcely a fortnight had passed since their arrival at Imladris, there his foster-brother sat, pale, but of reasonable health, when just nights before he lay dying. There was one, most grievous of nights, on which Elrond had called for him, unable to further endure his child’s tormented suffering. With one look at his elf-brother, Thranduil’s ghost had glared back: hollow, withered, and gasping. Yet there he stood, correcting Eldarion’s arrow-hold, adjusting his balance, encouraging him as ever before. /How can this be?/

“Tell me, gwanur-nîn,” he inquired cautiously of the troubled prince. “What brought on this strangeness?”

“I am uncertain as to the cause,” Legolas insisted, yet the truth shone clear enough from his saddened face. It sounded loud as Gondor’s own battle-horn whenever he looked northward. 

“I see.” Aragorn caught upon an idea. “I will fetch Lord Elrond. Perhaps he may prove insightful-“

“I am not ailing, Aragorn, merely dazed,” the archer snipped. “It will pass.”

“Then Elladan, perhaps,” the King essayed. “A Loremaster such as he could readily snuff-out the culprit, should it be ancient in origin, or obscure.”

“And what may his books tell me?” Legolas spat outright. “That I should pass over the sea?”

“Do you feel it may be the sea’s calling?” Aragorn queried innocently, the picture of brotherly concern. “It has struck you mightily. I have ere seen an elf so…overcome.”

“I am not *overcome*, as some lightheaded maiden,” the Mirkwood prince seethed, his cobalt eyes flaring. “I am merely… I am merely…” 

His vision softened, swayed anew; Legolas shut his eyes. Evasions could pass his prideful lips, but he could not form words to deny, to give the lie voice, to give it to one so dear, so honorable. To the King. 

“Merely in love, at long last,” Aragorn chuckled fondly. “Though it does take rather tenacious hold of you. Perhaps if you gave in…?”

“I will *not* give in!!” Legolas growled, which only caused the King to laugh more heartily. 

“My, you *are* quarrelsome,” he chided good-naturedly. “Little wonder it grips you with such teeth.” 

The prince fell quiet, unreasonably so. He sank back, though the hard shelf of rock offered no sanctuary, no respite. He turned his face away from the sun, into what little shadow his head could cast. 

“I cannot love another,” he decreed, as if to convince himself. “I will not.”

“And, yet, you do,” the King remarked delicately. “And quite deeply, by the looks of it.”

“I have not the heart to love him,” Legolas whispered. “He deserves… he does not deserve such a black and withered thing as mine own, cindered to coal as my father’s funeral pyre.” 

“Who among us has a heart not tarnished by some fault, or weakness of our nature?” Aragorn began, stroking his calloused fingers through the prince’s damp hair. “Would mine have been so pure, when I made Arwen my lady. My Queen. Yet she loves me… and I am but a foul-tempered, ungraciously-scented, roughshod Dunedain. Hardly blessed with your hallowed elven ways.” 

Legolas smirked, faintly, despite himself. Yet the darkness lingered. 

“He is restored, Aragorn,” the archer persisted. 

“Aye, he is much altered since I last saw him.”

“By what force?” Legolas implored. “By what possible force other than…?” 

The King’s eyes narrowed, seeing, at last, the matter’s gray focus. 

“It cannot be,” he ventured. “Who else among you remains unbound? Glorfindel is bound to Elrond, Erestor still frequents the serving-maid, Gorlomewen has long bedded Hellestiel. Ada would not dare chose Verithen or Caerir, their mutual devotion, though yet undeclared, in ample evidence… Elladan is his brother, though I dare not even think on this…” 

“You yourself told me of his body’s ravaging mere days ago,” Legolas reminded him. “You would not let me look on him, such was his resemblance to my Adar in his passing.” 

“Indeed,” Aragorn sighed, near-bafflement. “It is most… troubling.” 

Before either could suggest a plan of action, the faint scent of thick, acrid fumes blew through on the wind. A colossal, earth-quaking roar shot through the valley, bracing the trees and shoving the waves over-bank. Both warriors leapt to their feet, earlier musings forgotten in a tense, horrific instant. 

A cloud of black, hungry smoke crept over the eastern forest. Another furious groan sounded out. 

“The dragon,” Aragorn proclaimed, vainly attempting to harness his mounting excitement at the unavoidable promise of battle. “And the hunters half a day gone. We must take arms!!”

Without another thought, he drove into the river. 

“Vengeance will be a doting consolation,” Legolas snarled at the first sight of flames, then followed him to the shore.

* * * 

As the two darkling princes, one of Imladris and one of Gondor, galloped up the winding trails of Rivendell towards the stable and the adjoining armory, the earth shook so mightily that Elrohir could not distinguish the path’s unsteadiness from his own. Furious cyclones of leaves spun around them, branches snapped in their wake. The steps to the armory were quilted with foliage: willow wisps, uprooted thistles, scabs of birch bark, ederwood, haybale, even the long grass from the westward tombs. 

“Go to my father,” Elrohir ordered his charge through the din. “You will need his protection.”

“I would fight, saitë,” the young prince shouted over the wilding wind.

“I would that you lived to reign, pen-neth,” his guardian declared with unwavering finality. “As would the King.” With a sour nod, Eldarion scurried off, up to the main wing of the Last Homely House. Elrohir, a black smear amidst the violent gusts, soldiered on. 

His walking-stick long cleft in twain, the elf-warrior, spurred by the memory of the ravaged Mirkwood, felt no need of it. Indeed, when the dragon’s fearsome cry had blazed through the serene valley, his body had achieved a wickedly potent synchronicity with the beast’s incendiary rage. 

His dormant, knife-blade warrior’s senses were instantly reawakened; the scent of the potential kill provoked him, adrenalized every waning muscle, until he veritably throbbed with anticipation. He could already feel the hilt of his witch-sword prodding into his swollen palm; the slice of the jagged belly-edge through scaled flesh, the hot spurt of dragon’s blood a Valarian benediction, rich in his mouth like midsummer wine. 

The feeling gained further fire, when he entered the armory and came upon Legolas. 

“I will wield the sword of Angmar in the elf-knight’s stead,” the archer called over his shoulder, as he eyed the deadly wall of weapons. “What think you, Aragorn?” 

His ardent eyes the ominous blue of midnight and his still-sodden hair inked a dark gold, the entire sheath woven as the braids of the hostile Rohirrim, the woodland elf’s face betrayed an air of barely contained menace, as he raptly perused, with an executioner’s relish, the instrument selection. Yet he moved with poised economy, gathering, savoring his strength. His lean limbs were sheathed in sculpted armor, which conformed to every rip of his taut abdomen, the very plum of his biceps, his quiver and his Lorien bow bisecting the silver wash of his back. 

“I fear it would but prolong the beast’s agony,” Elrohir commented wryly. “Should I attack him unarmed. Best be swift, and merciless.”

“Menethren knew no mercy,” the archer seethed, his surging senses hearing the words but not the voice that spoke them. “I will banish the very word.”

The elf-warrior chose from the wall, as Legolas stood, transfixed by a vision of the vengeance he would wreak. 

“The Angmar is mighty, true,” he counseled. Elrohir lay a solid hand on the archer’s leathered shoulder, proffered a sleeker foil. “But it is a butcher’s blade. Try on this Mirkwood finery.”

“Igraneil,” Legolas murmured, awestruck. His gracious archer’s hands clasped the ivory hilt, then stroked enticingly along its shimmering length. “My father’s sword.” 

“The sword of the King of Mirkwood,” Elrohir corrected him. The sight of his maltaren holding the weapon of his birthright with such cruel intensity was so criminally arousing, he could almost claim him there and then. “It serves the one who bears the title.”

The uniquely held tone of the voice beside him finally penetrated through the archer’s bloodthirsty mind-set. His withering stare whipped up, slapping the elf-warrior back into the truth of the moment. 

“Elrohir!!” he exclaimed. “Why have you come here?!”

“To bloody my witch-blade with butchery,” he almost purred. “Why else, gwanur-nîn?” 

“You are unwell,” Legolas decreed, gripping his grandfather’s sword with fearsome finality. “You must seek shelter in the Homely House.”

“I will not,” Elrohir spat at him, turning away from the heart-clenching anger in his beloved’s eyes. “I ride with the Mirkwood King.” 

In broiling defiance, the elf-warrior tore off his cloak, yanked his armor off the wall. He clamped the hard metal over his now-aching chest, then fought, with trembling fingers, to bind the ties. He felt the short-lived spurt of energy seep decadently out of him, the sickly lethargy creeping through. Still, he would not give in. 

“I will not ride you to your death,” Legolas barked hoarsely, his throat parched near to choking. “Elrohir, I will not see you fall. I could not-“

“I will not fall,” the elf-warrior blasted, his preparations, though sluggish, perilously close to completion. “I will *slay*.” This last was hissed through clenched teeth, whether from menace or from shortness of breath, the archer could not surmise. 

The thought of Elrohir slain in this vengeful battle struck Legolas to the core. 

“I beg you, mellon-nîn,” he cried. “Gwanur-nîn!! Go to your father. Leave me my vengeance!!” 

The darkling elf paused only to bow his head. 

“I am sworn to you,” he renewed his pledge. “My hand in this will not be stayed.” 

Before the elf-warrior could take another step, the archer’s bow-string sang true. The sting of the arrowhead, now buried in the thick of his shoulder, was lost in the swoon of impact. The smack of the tiled armory floor, however, registered vividly. 

Footsteps sounded beyond the door.

“Aragorn!!” Legolas bellowed to his approaching friend. “Fetch your father!!” 

The boot clacks rapidly retreated, as the archer knelt over the wheezing peredhil. With astonishing gentility, he gathered Elrohir into his arms. Carefully, he removed the constricting armor, then dug the arrow blade out. He ably employed the elf-warrior’s cloak as both bandage and pillow, then lay him down across the floor. 

His eyes betrayed a bitter torment, as he gazed upon the twice-struck prince of Imladris. He bent to whisper to his sweat-slick temple. 

“Forgive me, melethron-nîn,” the Mirkwood prince cooed. “I told you of my weakness. I may not have had the strength to save you… but I cannot watch you fall.” 

As Elrohir, near-delusional, held fast against the voracious darkness, Legolas grazed supple, quivering lips across his sallow cheek, then pressed them timidly to his gasping mouth. The kiss was quiet, and unsure, the archer’s first since his woozy adolescence, but the feeling behind it burned pure, sucking the drifting spirit back to present day and sparking his soul’s waning flame. The darkling elf inhaled sharply, coughed, and Legolas quickly withdrew.

Before Elrohir could press him further, he was gone. 

* * * 

The stench, more foul than the Orc forges of Isengard melded with the bilious lava of Mount Doom then doused with troll sputum, announced them by a mile, but neither warrior seemed the least bothered by it. Their armor was brazed black, their clothing charred to rags, their bodies were splotched with olive-yellow ooze – the latest in dragon viscera… and their smiles cut a swath as broad as a ten-paddled canoe across their blood-smeared faces. 

“*Eglerio*!!” Legolas blasted into the smoke-streaked breeze, both heralding their return and trumpeting their victory. 

“Eglerio, Thranduilion!!” Aragorn echoed with twice the bass rumble, as he clamped a delightfully weary arm over the archer’s shoulders. “You have wreaked a thundering vengeance, gwanur. I wager the Halls of Mandos quake with the cheers of fallen Eldar warriors. The day is blessed.”

“Aye, it is that,” Legolas admitted, unable to quell his beaming smile even for a moment’s reflection. “I saw my father’s eyes, as I slew the beast. When last it cried out, I heard Menethren call the charge. They are at peace, Aragorn.” 

“And they are proud,” the King chimed in. “There will be revels in Mandos tonight!!” 

The two fighters laughed heartily, savoring the elation of conquest. Not since the War of the Ring had either had their swords so bloody, their instincts so challenged, their years of training so vital to their survival. Both basked in the last remnants of their battle-fever, in the waning moments of their cherished partnership. Though, in their private lives, both felt the pull of other mates, other friendships, neither could forswear a deeper kinship than that which they shared in the heat of battle. 

As brothers-in-arms, they would never be more perfectly matched. 

“The hunters will rue the day they chose a dozen quintail over such a fight,” Aragorn remarked mirthfully, his satisfaction undaunted. 

“I will have them sever the head, when they return,” Legolas noted, with wicked relish. “I shall have it bronzed and hung over the gates at Mirkwood. ‘All who pass hither do so at their own peril’!!” The former ranger hung over his side, nearly choked by his snickers. “Will you also claim a prize, mellon-nîn?” 

“A single tooth,” the King gracelessly recovered. “My smiths will core it and use the shell as a goblet. Legend tells, if you grind the core to powder…”

“What, then?” the archer queried, rapt with curiosity.

“It is a potent aphrodisiac,” Aragorn purred salaciously. “Though those who strike down their potential lovers come to make little use of such potions.”

“And a man with five daughters ought to consider the outcome of such a charm’s influence,” the prince shot back. His brow furrowed, not at the gibe, which even he felt well-deserved, but at the question of Elrohir’s condition. 

“Aye, gwanur-nîn, we are triumphant!!” The King boasted. “Do not linger on such gray matters, when there is so little time left to us. Let our glory ring across the valley-bed!!” 

His kill-sated smile renewed, Legolas joined him in a final cheer.

Their self-satisfied grins faded soon enough, when they marched through the Rivendell courtyard and came upon Elrond’s testy glare. Legolas’ face soured, fearing the worst, though the King’s barely-contained amusement was long from being smote. 

“We are victorious, Ada,” Aragorn declared, hoping to temper him. “The beast is slain.”

“And Thranduil avenged,” Elrond stated with knife-point precision. “Imladris claims the honor of offering shelter to her saviors. A pair of nobility, and valor…”

The two warriors grinned patiently, waiting for the axe to drop. 

“Whose dedication to their quest crushed every thing in their path,” Elrond near-snarled.

“Father!!” The King protested.

“Silence!!” Elrond cried, his eyes two wounded ebony pools. He turned the black hole of his stare on Legolas, who stood fast. “You will bathe. You will eat, then you will take rest, for none can deny you have fought bravely. You will *remain* in the north wing of the Homely House, and await the High Council’s decision, but you will not venture forth from your rooms unless under explicit order from I, myself, *alone*.”

“Is this how you treat a son of the Firstborn?!” Aragorn demanded, ablaze. 

“This is how I treat the one who has ensnared and corrupted the heart of my child!!” Elrond raged, not sparing even his foster son his fury. Yet a father he was, still, to this King of men, and the sight of his disbelieving eyes tempered him. “You rule in Gondor, Estel. *I* am Lord of Imladris. You have always respected that distinction. Respect it now. Take refreshment at the baths, then escort the prince to his rooms in the north wing. I warn you not to defy me.”

With that, Elrond swept up the steps, into the Last Homely House.

Aragorn let go an impassioned roar at his retreating father, unsheathing the fearsome Anduil and whipping her through the surrounding air. He stabbed her into the ground at his feet, as if into the dragon’s very flesh, the act appeasing his anger somewhat. He turned to Legolas, who had swallowed every scathing word like a hobbit after a hunger strike. The pearls of his cheeks had sunken in; his cerulean eyes now cinched, hollow. 

“He is dead,” the prince rasped, broken. 

Aragorn clasped his limp arms, as if to shake the hope back into him. 

“If he were dead, you would be free to roam. He would not sequester you so severely.”

“Then he is bound,” the archer mused, almost seeming to prefer him dead. “Why else lock me away, until he is freely loved by another?”

“You underestimate how totally paternal pride can fog even the most learned father’s mind. His behavior is rash, instinctive. The Sea’s call is fierce, and his suffering, ever constant. He can no longer bear the weight of Imladris’ rule.” 

“In this, we are shameful brothers,” Legolas barely spoke, the day’s maddening trial overtaking him. 

“Come, gwanur,” Aragorn cooed, weaving an arm around his waist and guiding him up the steps. “We will rest your cleaving heart. So full, and yet still so newly formed.” 

Later, when the balming flow of the mineral bath enveloped him, Legolas saw clearer. 

Sunk in the whirling pool’s sensuous depths, a cup of miruvor on the pielstone ledge and his sage king-brother by his side, the Mirkwood prince released the last of his burdens into the silken swells that massaged over his steaming skin. Wooed by the tongues of lethargy lapping along his creaking limbs, he momentarily surrendered to the lush, vaporous sensation that filled him. 

“Drink,” the King laxly urged. “It will restore you.”

The archer slowly lifted the cup to his mouth, the hot liquid gushing over his ready lips, soothing the walls of his throat. 

“They have warmed it,” he remarked, not overly impressed. 

“Arwen often adds a splash of cream,” Aragorn noted. “She craves the sweetness.” 

“And you, if I do not mistake, crave her company,” the prince smirked, with little malice.

“Aye, that I do,” the King sighed, lost to contemplation. “To find solace in her arms, to celebrate this day’s glory with her, in our bed… I would treasure the rarity of such an end. Such a tender gift…” Aragorn pinched his eyes shut, rubbed his wrinkled brow. “I prove fine comfort to you.”

“I am green in the ways of love,” Legolas replied. “Your longing is an able teacher.” 

“So you concede to love,” Aragorn concluded, treading as carefully as a dove on a turret’s ledge. 

Legolas fell pensive; his look distant, pained.

“If he would chose me,” came the vague reply.

“Does the fading heart chose?” the King pondered. “I wonder…” 

“If I am his choice, and truly thus,” Legolas responded, with rapt sincerity. “If he would suffer my coarseness… then I would give him this unruly heart.” The archer’s tranquil blue eyes drifted down, into the molten depths of the baths. 

With a faint blush, he added: “I love him, Aragorn.” 

The King, heartened by this admission, pressed further. “Then you must go to him. Declare yourself.”

“And what of Elrond’s fury?”

“It will pass,” Aragorn all-too-easily dismissed. “It will be immediately overthrown when the realization hits him that, in order for Elrohir to fully recover, you must-”

“I cannot think the Lord of Imladris so full of hubris that he would condemn his fading child to such black ravaging for spite, Aragorn. He *must* be bound.”

“I think you mistake Elrond’s wisdom for selflessness. He is ever married to his ways.”

“I pray Elbereth *you* do not mistake him,” the prince vowed darkly.

“Such melancholy, this love evokes in you,” Aragorn teased fondly, hoping to distract him. “You should rejoice. You heart is opened.”

“How can I rejoice when my heart lays dying by my own hand?!” Legolas cried, with chilling ferocity. “Time and again I strike him down, time and again I cleave to the core of him and gut him through. I am a menace. I am too ill-formed to love him well!! And though I cannot else but claim my love… I cannot shake the fear that it will be the end of him. No matter what passes between us.” 

Silence fell, swift, razing like a scythe. Neither dared speak for some time, the frankness of the prince’s bleak pronouncement resounding, like a shrill bell, through the bath hall. Aragorn drained his glass down, inwardly praying for words, any words, that might inspire the prince to cast off the guilt that consumed his very soul and poisoned the heaving tide of his passions. Now, more than ever before, the King wished his blessed wife beside him. 

“I will go to him, this night, gwanur,” Aragorn resolved, at last. “I will tell the toll of it, give him the choice. He is a warrior of proud conscience. He may chose death.” 

“Or my death,” Legolas stated, without a trace of emotion. “This, he may choose.” 

Aragorn bowed once, chastely, the fangs of true fear sinking into him for the first time since their brave Fellowship had left Imladris, in charge of the burdensome Ring.


	6. Edro

/“Let us stay rather on earth, Beloved, - where the unfit  
Contrarious moods of men recoil away  
And isolate pure spirits, and permit  
A place to stand and love in for a day,  
With darkness and the death-hour rounding it.”/

As he strode through the drapes of shadow and the pools of torch-light along the northern hallway at Imladris, the King of Gondor was deeply shroud in thought. Though his parting words to Legolas had been hopeful, the Mirkwood prince’s bleak attitude had rooted dark, cloying weeds of doubt in his own faith in love. Perhaps the blissful outcome of his own romantic toils had spoiled him to the perils love could wring from the unsuspecting soul. 

In his youth, Aragorn, though heir to the throne of Gondor, had never defined himself as more than a ranger, an elf-friend. While he had once led the most daunting charge Middle-Earth had ever known, his was not a true warrior’s heart. The hunt thrilled him on occasion, as did the remembered glories of his elf-brother by his side; this day’s kill had indeed been such a moment. That moment ended, the King had gratefully reclaimed his throne, his pacifist’s spirit renewed. 

Not so for the prince, haunted as his homeland, who, in all his hundreds of years, had never shed the burden of his warrior’s vow. Legolas had never in his life taken a breath without the threat of some invasion: in the declining Mirkwood of his youth, on the deadly quest to destroy the Ring, in the winter of his fading kinsmen from this Middle-Earth. /Little wonder he fears this choke-hold love will sunder him. And with Elrohir’s blundering example…/

Nevertheless, the archer’s latest fatalistic pronouncements would thaw the most arctic of hearts. Thranduil’s choice of death had only further blackened his son’s graying view of the nobility of devotion; if Aragorn knew him but a little, he would judge his last, most self-indicting decrees a foiled despot’s cunning plot masked as incensed ravings. Regardless, the matter was now in his hands. 

He must seek Elladan’s counsel. He prayed his twinness proved a boon, not a hindrance. Seconds before he gave thought to seeking out his foster-brother, two be-gowned figures floated up the steps, from the eastern wing, their drawn faces in pious contemplation of some grave matter. 

When the King met up with them, he gave a start.

“Melethron,” Aragorn exclaimed, at the sight of his Queen. Arwen gasped, then threw open her arms, gathering her husband’s weary bulk into their soothing folds. 

The King, felled by such tenderness, gripped into her lithe, doting frame, yet mindful of the ripening bud at her belly. This he knelt to bless with a kiss, after first drawing thickly from her ready mouth. Rising, he melded to her again, weaving his arms around her downy curves and burying his face in her neck. 

“Are you well, nîn ind?” he asked, his voice burdened with concern. “The beast…”

“We came from the west,” she assured him. “And were safe in the Homely House when the dragon struck.” She sunk further into his arms, not needing to give her own worries voice. 

“And our daughters?”

“They remain with Accathiral, in the White City,” she explained. “All but the little one, who I could not part from. But she weathered the journey with able Gondorian fortitude.”

“Aye, I am glad of it,” Aragorn sighed, still reluctant to release her. “As I am to have your strength with me in these trying times, my love.” Only then did the King make note of her companion, the very Loremaster he sought. 

“Indeed,” she murmured, pressing her cheek to his chest. “We have just come from my brother’s bedside.” The skip in her throat spoke volumes of the elf-warrior’s condition. “He is so proud. And I, selfishly, could only think: what if my lord had been so in our relations? What if I had lost you to a warrior’s wrongheaded notions of virtue?”

“Do not reproach yourself,” he appeased her. “I could think only the same.” He pulled gently away, gazing into her soft face. “I longed so desperately for your strength through these black nights, my lady.”

“It is here, husband,” she cooed, lacing warm, lissome fingers through the slick waves of his hair. “I would first speak of the morrow with my dear brother, but then we too shall retire.”

“I already long for it,” Aragorn all but groaned, then turned his attention to Elladan. “Come to our rooms awhile, Loremaster. I also have grave matters to impose upon you.”

With a preoccupied nod, Elladan shuffled after them, his focus despondently inward. He did not seem to have noticed a moment of what had transpired between them. By the time they swept into the elegant simplicity of the Queen’s sitting room, Elladan had not recovered himself. 

The King, ever officious, began at once. “What news of Elrohir?” Arwen looked to her brother, who exhaled a long, measured breath. 

“He is… coping well, I suppose,” Elladan offered blankly. “His wound is virtually healed. By what force, none can say. The grief still grips him, but he holds ever fast, aided, I’ve no doubt, by the vehement fury he shares with our Adar. I believe you felt its heat this late afternoon.” 

“Aye,” Aragorn acknowledged, a hint of mirth creeping into his tone. “The dragon seemed less fearsome.” He took his place on the divan by his wife, his worry somewhat tempered by this news. “But how can Elrohir charge his love so harshly? Surely he can see reason enough for Legolas’ actions.”

“A warrior’s pride,” Arwen almost spat, so bitterly that her husband clasped a gentling hand over her own. 

“Elrohir is sworn to the Mirkwood prince,” Elladan elaborated. “Ignorant, or in spite of the gravity of his condition, my brother invoked this sacred oath in expressing his desire to ride with your dragonslaying party. By forsaking this allegiance, Legolas… betrayed the warrior’s code. Elrohir accepts his refusal in love…”

“But not in battle,” Aragorn mused, his patience chafing. “Such foolishness…”

“He has been shamed by the one he holds dear,” Arwen added thoughtfully. “Whom he had consoled in his needful time. Yet now, there is none to console him. Thranduil bravely chose to give himself to his grief, to follow his fallen love to Mandos. As a warrior, Elrohir can lay no claim to bravery in fading thus.”

“Yet this very morning he rose from what many judged to be his deathbed,” the King reminded them. “What of this miraculous event? What say you, Elladan? Can your twinness shed light on this incongruity?”

Elladan veritably shied away from the question, as if he had feared it all along. Cautiously, he lifted his face to address his foster-brother, his gray eyes purpled with torment. Until that moment, Aragorn had not afore understood the weight the Loremaster had silently borne, since this misguided business had begun. Ever the more learned, yet more timid, of the two, Elladan often deferred to Elrohir in matters of state and of imminent action, preferring his brother to give voice to his own concerns, these whispered to him in private. Few would charge him weak, but few would require him to lead the charge. 

Elladan, gathering strength from his foster-brother’s muted, familiar gaze, made an attempt to relate the tides of feeling that pooled within him. 

“He grieves still,” he tentatively stated. “This, I know. The sickness of it grates… curdles even the weakest broth. I feel it, consuming him, yet… he seems to consume it, as well. He feeds off of it – his will does – and it warms him, little by little. His flame. He seems to have turned it against itself… I know not how…”

“Sheer, peerless might,” Aragorn shook his head, impressed. “His valor matched by only one other in all of Middle-Earth. That is how.”

“Which other, love?” Arwen inquired.

“*Legolas*,” the King scowled somberly. “And yet in love they strike blindly, razing all in their lumbering wake!!” 

“And what of the prince, Estel?” Elladan essayed.

“He speaks in tongues, gwanur,” Aragorn snorted dryly, his frustration mounting. “Tell me true, are the elves of Elrond’s line kin to the Maiar, as he claims?”

“We are,” Elladan barely breathed out, anticipation of the King’s next words gripping the core of him. 

“I have never seen his mood so black,” the ranger admitted, growing pale. “He thinks himself so unworthy of love that he… He has asked me to go to our brother, to make him chose… He claims that, among the Maiar, there is a primitive tradition. That one who grieves may revive his fading spirit by sacrificing the life of his beloved. By killing him.” 

Arwen, despite herself, gasped. Elladan sunk further into the cushions of his seat.

“In ages past,” the Loremaster recounted dully. “The love of one male for another was considered… unholy, by some. It is accepted now, among elfkind, since all but a few elf-maiden have passed over to the Sea. Even some time before, such feelings went unremarked upon, but back then… before the Firstborn came into being… The noble choice for one so stricken was to…” He swallowed hard, then added, “I am uncertain whether the Valar would favor such a choice, in our time. But I doubt the consequences would be… severe. He could pass to Valinor unhindered.” 

Silence fell, as thick and obscuring as a funeral veil. It was Arwen who spoke first, and this, like a clarion bell. 

“We must prevent this,” she forswore. “We *must* make them see reason.” She turned to her husband and clamped a yearning hand over his chest. “Else *my* heart will break.”

* * * 

With slim, meticulous fingers, the despondent Lord of Imladris lay the mullseed compress across his son’s chest. The spiced heat blunted the darkling elf’s scraping wheeze to a dry rasp, but would do little to abate the scalding flush of his feverish skin. Though his arrow wound had healed in a matter of hours, the insidious grief-sickness had intensified beyond remedy, the ailments too numerous to conquer, or at the least assuage, in one collective assault.

The fever had come with his anger; his flesh pink, swollen, his lips chapped and flaking, the whites of his eyes bloodied to an iridescent scarlet. Still, his elf-knight soldiered through, as the fever sucked the very marrow from his bones, as his throat engorged to near-suffocation, as his veins bulged up, burrowing under the sheet of his skin like agile, aquamarine snakes. 

Rather than harrowing, the night had been an endless dirge, Elrohir’s ragged breaths droning, like a knell, through the hush of the room. Elladan had kept vigil at his brother’s side, repetitively stroking soft, gracious hands over his, often humming songs from their childhood to comfort him. At times, despite his difficult respiration, Elrohir could be faintly heard to murmur along with him, the only sign Elrond had that his child was still, on some level, coherent. 

By the window, in Glorfindel’s arms, he prepared himself as well as any father could. 

A red dawn bled through the dragon fumes, as if the sky itself would mourn him. The forest beyond the window loomed, static, not a hint of wind, not a birdsong, not a creature stirring. The horses bucked in their stalls, but the touch they favored would not wield the brush that morning. Brown, charred leaves blanketed the trails, the lawn, not a patch of green visible around the barren, weeping willow branches. 

A sharp knock sounded from the door and broke the silence. 

Aragorn slid into the room at Glorfindel’s bidding, his slate-blue eyes instantly drawn to the ravaged figure on the bed. Visibly willing himself to steady, to steel, the King tread over to his foster-brother’s side, gathering the length of his arm in his lap and taking gentle hold. 

Elrohir smiled faintly in recognition; Elrond’s heart skipped. 

Aragorn fondly brushed his fingers through the darkling elf’s long, raven hair, locking eyes with his brother. Elladan lay himself down on the other side of the bed, pressing his face against that of his ailing twin, hugging to him. Never releasing his groggy arm, Aragorn leaned over, kissed the elf-warrior on his throbbing brow, then bent further, to his ear. He whispered to him for some time, so low Elrond could not make out a word. 

At first, Elrohir began to wheeze again, his teeth grit so fiercely Elrond thought his jaw might crush them to powder. He rose to object, but Glorfindel restrained him. Elladan laid a warm, solid hand over his twin’s heart, which seemed to calm him. Aragorn’s lush rumble of a voice grew louder. An anxious pulse flooded Elrond’s ears, preventing him from full comprehension. Elrohir’s eyes suddenly widened, their scarlet humor nearly spilling over, then promptly shut, creasing at the seam. His face grew lax, desolate; Elrond, fearing the end had come, staggered into Glorfindel. After Aragorn rose, his tale told, he wove his callused fingers through Elladan’s, over their weary brother’s heart. 

Elrohir gulped breaths sharply in, then choked out vicious, scouring coughs, as he heaved himself into a seating position. Aragorn and Elladan came swiftly to his aid, easing his legs over the edge of the bed, standing at his side, to steady him. 

“Rest now, gwanur,” Aragorn insisted, nevertheless bearing the brunt of his weight. “He will come to you.”

“No, Estel,” Elrohir, who Elrond thought beyond the power of speech, asserted, as he struggled for air. “It is I who must go to him.” 

The motley caravan lurched forward; with careful, agonizing steps, the elf-warrior regained his footing. Elrond, momentarily frozen, gaped at his son’s near-instantaneous progress, the fever pouring out of him in great, gushing streams of sweat, so that Aragorn and Elladan’s clothes were soon soaked through. 

Seizing hold of his senses, he rushed to intervene. 

“Elrohir,” he implored, blocking their path. “What in Elbereth’s name has possessed you?!”

“I have little strength left, Ada,” the elf-knight confronted his father. “I will not spend it quarrelling.”

“It will be the death of you, nîn ind,” Elrond begged him, reaching out to touch his paling cheek. 

“He is my only chance at life,” he bleated, the strain nauseating him. He grunted adamantly at himself, then urged them forward. “Ada, I will go to him. I will have my life!!”

“Very well,” Elrond barely exhaled. He stepped aside.

The Lord of Imladris turned, as they ambled past, and watched the door close behind them.

“Namarië, melethron,” he whispered to the empty room. “Gerich veleth nîn.”

* * * 

“Fetch me my sword, Estel,” Elrohir commanded between raw-throated draughts of air, as they hobbled haltingly by the armory door. He collapsed his weight against his twin brother, his legs unable to carry on. “I would rest here awhile.” 

“Elrohir?” the King inquired, after they’d sat him on a nearby bench. Aragorn observed naught but the insidious strain of effort on his foster-brother’s face; still, the sudden, deadly request struck to the core of him. “What purpose would this serve you? You cannot walk unaided…”

“Fetch it!!” Elrohir barked, though without ire. 

/He has not the strength to quarrel,/ Aragorn reminded himself, then briefly nodded in acquiescence. 

Before the elf-warrior could recover himself, the King had slipped through the armory doors. He turned to his gentle twin, whose face betrayed yet a touch of tempered amusement. 

“I have never had occasion to observe such fear in him,” Elladan remarked, hugging once again to his brother’s side. 

“He is unpracticed, to be so easily felled,” Elrohir agreed, his even humor dulled by the grip of pain. “I would hearten him to it. A King should know to best his fear.”

“Indeed,” his twin chuckled fondly. “And what of a Loremaster?”

Despite his fatigue, Elrohir gave a start.

“Elladan,” he reproached. “Is your worry so riotous as to deafen you to our shared feeling?”

“I hear its music,” Elladan tread with caution. “But the melody deceives. It is too assonant to be of your timbre, yet there can be no other’s sound within me.” 

Elrohir accepted this, without comment, for some time. Wearily, he eased his lids shut. Unable to fully control his breathing, he gulped in a torrent of dry, scraping air, then pushed the entirety from his phlegm-thick lungs in a foul gust. Sinking his focus inward, he broke free of the physical pain, curling into the undulating heat at the center of his being that linked their twinness. 

Elladan’s weight pressed against his lax frame, as his brother allowed himself to descend into the baking core of their oneness. Rare were the times when they could retreat to their common, corporeal sanctuary, where their very proximity reconnected the two halves of their spirit and reenacted their yearlong embrace in the womb. Only in moments of high anxiety could they regress those generative steps, to re-forge the bond that could never be truly severed. 

In that hallowed moment, Elrohir revealed himself to his brother: the trenchant scars of his grief, the bitter remnants of love, the all-consuming anger, the dim hope cast by his waning flame. He drew from the pearlescent sphere of his twin’s pure heart, feeding on his brotherly concern, his Loremaster’s wisdom, and his own long-contented love of another. Releasing the last of himself, their spirits flowed into one immaculate whole. 

In an instant, Elrohir’s eyes fluttered open, consciousness and self retuned. Reserves of strength lay vigilant within his aching limbs, patiently waiting-out the crucial moment of confrontation with the Mirkwood prince. Still, he managed to cradle his shaken twin, tenderly wiping tears from his eyes. 

“I have never known such… such intensity of emotion,” Elladan sniffed, as he struggled to recover himself. “I would be smote by such a ferocious love, gwanur.” 

“Ah, but the depth of it does not affect you,” Elrohir smirked playfully. “Just the fury. Curious, that.”

Elladan sighed softly, snuggling closer, a mite too melodramatically. Few with the Loremaster’s sweet temper could long fool one to whom they were so closely bound. 

“Are Erestor’s eyes bright with the Sea’s call?” Elrohir teased. “Or merely the sight of your loveliness?” 

Elladan leapt bolt upright, his misty eyes glaring. 

“You are ever the able student, gwanur-nîn,” the elf-warrior added. “Well-schooled by his tenderness. I daresay our tutor’s affection has aided, by example, in my own care these last few weeks.” The Loremaster stared on, incredulous, as his brother confessed the paucity of their deception. “But it is foul mischief to hide yourselves from Ada’s watchful eye, Elladan. Though I doubt he is much fooled by such rumor-mongering ridicule as this business with the serving-maid...”

“You have… felt this?” Elladan stuttered bashfully, the truth of it blazing from his cheeks. “Is our twinness so strong in you?”

“I have known it since the days of our fighting lessons, a thousand years hence,” Elrohir laughed outright, his own color much improved. “Though I believe Erestor’s love is rather newly born, is it not?”

“Newly declared,” Elladan elucidated. “But long felt. He has kept the burden of it. As have I, since my coming of age, both of us fearing Ada’s wrath. But since the shadow’s fall, and my return to Imladris from the war…” The Loremaster swallowed a quiet smile at the thought of his beloved. 

“Tell me, gwanur,” Elrohir asked carefully. “Erestor is old, and proud. His duty to the protection of Imladris, to your protection, is more dearly held than any of his own desires. How did you win him?” 

His twin again gave at start, understanding, at last, the darker purpose of his good-humored torments. He fell briefly to contemplation, recalling the string of awkward blunders and near-insurmountable misunderstandings that had led to their first, awesome moment of passion. Relieved that they had been at last discovered, Elladan wished he could take time to recount the totality of the tale, to indulge in a few hours praise of his lover’s secret beauty. 

“I hope one day to tell the toll of it,” the Loremaster responded, his look swollen with both love-thick and brotherly affection. “For I know well you would be much amused. But I fear I cannot say what particular thing it was that overcame his strident nature. We simply… came together, one day.”

“The mere sight of you, no doubt,” Elrohir joked, but with an edge. “Aye, I was similarly bested. But this archer of mine… how am I to win him?” The elf-warrior grew pale, his once rose-pricked cheeks foundering to a sallow cream. “He would rather die at my hands than give in to my love.” 

Elladan, brutally struck, could scarcely form words to reply.

* * * 

With acute exasperation, Legolas pressed the smooth plain of his brow to the cool windowpane, the hazy atmosphere beyond clouding his bleary stare. The red dawn had fused with the dragon’s death fumes into an overcast, sulfurous sky, as if shielding the blithe heavens from the onerous activities below. A crimson daybreak was an ill portent. Coupled with the beast’s vile smoke…

The Mirkwood prince sighed, shut his brimming eyes. /The High Elves do not care for such woodland folklore as weather-signs and leaf-casting. Just as well./ 

In a blind instant, he bashed both his fists onto the glass, wrenched himself away, then stalked across the length of the room. Another sleepless night captive in this chamber of subtle torments would erode the rock-hard foundation of his respect for the Lord of Imladris into finely grained dust, not accounting for the grinding of his teeth’s ivory. No warrior of his mettle would allow himself be so indulgently detained. Indeed, over the endless drudge of the night, Legolas had entertained a thousand methods of escape, none so alluring as marching past the unguarded door, through the empty halls, and into their vigilant midst at Elrohir’s bedside. There, amid their grating protests, he would prostrate himself at the elf-knight’s hand and… 

/And pray that his betrothed does not slit my throat./

The archer turned his embittered eyes back towards the glass, the cloying murk beyond. A bilious shame scored through his insides, scraping the very marrow from his bone-brittle resolve. He had brought the gloom of Mirkwood here to beauteous Rivendell, the taint of his Silvan blood to the peredhil’s hallowed heart. Their people’s alliance had been forged by the threat of Mordor’s infernal hearths; the peace of men could not solder such brimstone bonds, should they crack and crumble. /Little wonder they have me caged./ 

Legolas thought he would spit fire if they did not release him soon.

The length of his chamber door rumbled, announcing the King. He spun around, his face beaming with gratitude, only to confront a sight gutting to behold. He froze.

Shrugging off the aid of his two companions, Elrohir swept into the room with a focused, yet tremulous, grace. Though still clad in his bed robes, his sword-belt clung to his skeletal hips, emphasizing the anemic cinch of his waist. The nimble angles of his face were sharpened to fine, delicate points, his skin near translucent in its pallor. The haunting effect, coupled with the incisive glare of his indigo eyes, left the Mirkwood prince bereft, his guilt blunt, brazing. He could do nothing but stare, as the elf-warrior unsheathed his witch-sword and aimed its gluttonous blade at him. 

“By the will of the Maiar, my kin, I have risen,” Elrohir pronounced boldly. “I come to claim my right, Prince of Mirkwood.” 

The archer’s chill, cobalt eyes locked into his razing stare, searching for the faintest sign of feint. He found none. 

With a solemn bow, Legolas knelt before him. 

“Elrohir!!” Aragorn charged forth. “What is this madness?!” 

Elladan moved to restrain him, but Aragorn stayed him back. The King, though livid, knew better than to challenge his sickly brother’s tenuous strength. Instead, he moved between them, the ruthless sword-point inches from his chest. 

“I have chosen, Estel,” came the unfeeling reply. 

“This cannot be the choice of your heart, my brother,” Aragorn pursued, his eyes wild with fear, with feeling.

“I have no heart,” Elrohir insisted morosely. “Only shards are left, from its breaking.” His jaw steeled. “But I would have my life. Aye, I would have that bleak consolation.” 

“I will not let you do this,” Aragorn seethed, as the Loremaster again leapt to still his charge. The King tossed him off, spinning around to confront the kneeling prince. “And you!! You accept this fate?! Laying down before him, yielding to his madness, like a buck caught in the briar?!” 

“Estel,” Elladan urged patiently, resting a quiet hand on his heaving collarbone. “Let them come to a resolution in private.”

“I am sworn to him as dearly as to my own brother,” Aragorn fumed, in torrid vexation. 

“You are powerless in this, gwanur-nîn,” the Loremaster reminded him. 

The King grunted, once, indignant, then shook off his hold. He peered down at Legolas, barely able to dam the goading swells of sorrow.

“Remember your father’s final words, in his passing,” Aragorn compelled him. “Remember his dying wish, Legolas!!” 

With a last, withering glare at Elrohir, the King fell in behind his foster-brother, retreating to the hall. 

At the clink of the turning lock, the elf-warrior swallowed hard. He fought to still the tremors shaking through his feeble grip, the claws of pain seizing cruel hold of him. The Mirkwood prince could no longer meet his bracing stare, his eyes glazed, introspective. The King’s brutal decree had hit its mark. Elrohir corralled his last reserves of strength, and pressed his advantage. 

“Fear not, archer, I will be swift,” he declared. 

“You have known no mercy,” Legolas barely gave voice to his reply. “I would have none from you.” 

“Brave to the last,” Elrohir taunted him. “You are your father’s son.”

“I make no claim to his glory.”

“Look on me!!” the elf-warrior barked suddenly. “I would see the truth of your eyes.” 

When Legolas raised his hollow, hurting gaze, the sickness bit deep. 

“There is one truth, and only thus, Elrohir,” the archer answered softly. “I am yours.” 

Caught in a blaze of fury, the elf-warrior staggered forward, pressing the blade into the thin skin of his throat. 

“You would have me then?!” Elrohir snarled. “To love with your barren heart? To *cherish* as the lethal steel of your slit-knives?”

“I would…” Legolas tore his eyes away, his pride making meat of his resolve. “I would have your sentence. Your choice. Nothing more.”

“Then my love is as black a condemnation as death,” Elrohir groaned, the agony overtaking him. He stabbed his witch-sword into the floor, his arthritic hands clasping the sweat-slick hilt. With a fierce, guttural growl, he pressed on. “Why?! Why does my love mean nothing to you, when it rages still within me, when it has staved off the hand of death itself?!” He retched instinctively, then forced the keen acid back. With the ebbing fumes of his might, he bore down on the corrosive, enveloping grief, stealing back these final, precious moments of life. “For I live only by the love of you. It is this fire that feeds my eternal flame. It has borne my spirit through the shadow and holds me strong even now, this knowledge, this love.” 

Legolas leapt to his feet, his breaths thundering through his chest as raggedly as the elf-warrior’s own. He reached out to the rasping, fading knight, but was stayed by his wounded stare. 

“How can you think even for a moment that I could…” Elrohir heaved in a tight, cloying breath. “That I could even raise a hand to harm you, my dearest one… I would rather be Sauron’s whore, refashioned as a sniveling orc, than ever see you hurt, maltaren-nîn… melethron-nîn…” 

The deadly witch-sword clanked dully to the floor, as Legolas swept the darkling elf into his strong arms. With care to his fragility, he shook him, hoping to flame the embers of his dimming light. 

“Harken to me, love,” he cried, hugging his leaden form with all his might. “You have my heart!! I would have our life, Elrohir. I would have our love.” 

The elf-warrior’s heavy arms wove around his solid frame, cleaving to him. The Mirkwood prince pressed their cheeks together, the coupled streams of their tears balming their fever-flushed skin. Elrohir languished in the archer’s blanketing heat, his body’s defenses drawing deeply from this potent source. Though far from completely renewed, his legs were soon able to bear some well-supported weight, which allowed him to rest his still woozy head on Legolas’ shoulder. 

“Tell me again,” he urged, still unable to lengthen his shallow pants.

“I am yours,” Legolas murmured, his hold tightening further. 

“Again.”

“I would have our love, my brave one,” he repeated with undisguised affection, but remained preoccupied by his grave condition. “Should you not take rest, melethron?” 

“And your heart?” 

“Your very own,” the Mirkwood prince assured him. “But you are still so weak…” 

“Stay,” Elrohir implored him. “I need you close.” 

Carefully, the elf-knight raised his groggy head from his most welcoming shoulder. Though sheltered in the protection of his arms, doubts as to the archer’s sincerity still nipped at the edges of his senses. When his full, violet eyes met the prince’s, his continued anxiety was plain. The cause, however, remained elusive. 

“What else may you require, love?” Legolas asked, his tone surprisingly timid. “Would you bathe? Eat? Sleep, certainly, would refresh you…”

“Your lips would be ample refreshment, maltaren-nîn,” Elrohir grinned faintly, then thickly brushed his own over the archer’s trembling mouth. 

Legolas gasped at the sensation and withdrew with a jolt, blushing fiercely. Elrohir indulged in a soft chuckle, then pressed on into a gentle, enticing caress. He felt his prince struggle to steady his quaking arms; his inexperience shaming him. The darkling elf worked firm, comforting fingers over the archer’s neck and into his flaxen hair, easing the pangs that shook him. 

As in battle, Legolas was not quickly won over, despite his love’s obvious, enthralling skill. Caught in a sigh, Elrohir claimed his hot mouth, stroking the velvet length of his tongue along the prince’s own rough texture. Legolas moaned appreciatively, opening to him. An able student, he surrendered to this rapturous friction, sucking deeply, wantonly at the elf-knight’s stirring lips. 

The kiss was of such tenderness, Elrohir was soon able to stand unaided. Still, the need for rest lapped just as ardently at his aching limbs. Legolas, lips swollen blissfully scarlet, recognized his love’s weariness and broke away, the nagging worry still rimming his dizzy eyes. With a dazed, slightly giddy smile, he cradled the half-elf to him. 

“Come, nin bellas,” he murmured, guiding him over to the waiting bed. “Sleep beckons us both.” 

As he lay Elrohir across the pristine sheets, Legolas swayed, stumbled. He shook his head, laughing at himself, as he fumbled with the elf-warrior’s sword-belt. 

“Ah, the fearless Prince of Mirkwood,” Elrohir teased, his eyes twinkling. “A rider of unmatched speeds, an archer of lethal skill, at one with his deadly twin-blades… undone by a mere overture of a kiss.” 

Legolas ripped the belt out from under him, his cheeks flaming anew. 

“This was but… an *overture*,” he rasped, his eagerness and his discomfort both clearly in evidence. 

As was, Elrohir noted, a budding arousal. The ease with which the darkling elf was able to unravel him could, in the future, prove dangerously addictive. 

“Melethron,” Legolas began, visibly willing himself to focus. “As much as I long… *desperately* long to…” He found he could not continue, his throat parched at the very thought of their coupling. 

“Soon, maltaren-nîn,” Elrohir soothed him, lazily weaving their fingers together. “Even I know when I am bested. My affections would be poor consolation now. Best to delay them.” 

“Aye,” Legolas echoed, with little conviction. His eyelids drooped to half-mast, as if in rapt contemplation of some lush melody. His fingers lingered over the delicate skin of Elrohir’s wrist, sending tendrils of pleasure creeping up the length of his arm. Elrohir plucked his hand away. 

“Legolas,” he mused, wishing he could give in to the fair prince’s ministrations. “You best take a moment to ease the King’s mind, before Estel looses hold of himself and breaks down the door.” 

“Disturbing our rest,” the prince sighed, waking from his reverie. “And shall I request a bath, for morning? Soothe your weary bones...” 

“Already such a doting lover,” Elrohir smirked, pleased by this tenderness. 

As he sauntered over to the door, Legolas unfastened the laces of his tunic. The anxious King appeased, the archer relieved himself of his garments and crawled, suddenly conscious only of his exhaustion, under the consoling covers. Elrohir, he discovered, was heavy with slumber. 

He curled into his beloved’s warm embrace, giving in, at last.

 

 

A/N: Don’t fret, there’s more. You didn’t think I’d leave off without some serious comshucking, did you? (Sorry, wrong fandom.) 

Maltaren-nin My Golden Prince

Melethron Beloved

Gwanur Brother

Gerich veleth nin You have my love.

Namarie Farewell

Nin bellas My strength

Nin ind My heart


	7. Melethron

“When our two souls stand up erect and strong,  
Face to face, silent, drawing nigh and nigher,  
Until the lengthening wings break into fire  
At either curved point, - what bitter wrong  
Can the earth do to us, that we should not long   
Be here contented?”

Though the balming, loam-scented waters of their bath had chilled, neither elf had broken their embrace long enough to take note. For hours, mercurial, elemental Mirkwood had plundered the lush hollows of seasoned Imladris; his ardent tongue relishing the subtle textures, tantalizing the most sensitive sweeps, uncovering the stirring nuances of their deep kiss. 

With every luscious draught on the near-purple smear of his lips, Elrohir felt another rigid joint release, another spear of pain withdraw from his calcite muscles. Though enmeshed in the weave of their fervent, grasping arms, the silken lengths of their skin, the sodden locks of their hair, their hips remained resolutely apart, floating in the stagnant bathwater between them. 

As Legolas dedicated his devout attention to suckling the elf-knight’s bottom lip, Elrohir allowed his curious fingers to linger above the archer’s navel, the clenched abdominals below confirming his thick-headed suspicions. Ever-conscious of his beloved’s diminished capacities, the archer silently suffered through what must be, after a long morning’s soak and grope, a fiercely potent arousal. In consideration of this unusually tormenting agony, as well as the cool sterility of the water, Elrohir took a smoldering draught from his love’s ripe mouth, then eased away. 

Legolas rasped a moan in protest, tracing the length of the elf-warrior’s swollen lips with a lecherous tongue-tip and newly lapping them apart. Unlike his previous pleasuring, the kiss was bold, unrelenting, the apprentice now graduated to the full, lustful mastery of the form. A surge of longing seared through the still-ailing prince of Imladris, to which his body could not respond. Instead, he stroked his slender, gracious fingers down, over the archer’s strident loins. Legolas groaned hoarsely in surprise, unable to avoid responding to the unexpected adventuring of his touch. He bucked forward, bit into his mouth, and, in one great gush of heat, spent himself over his wrist. 

“Forgive me,” the Mirkwood prince panted, sinking his weight down over him. With his mop of golden hair splayed wild, his head lolled into the cradle of elf-knight’s collar, his shallow, grasping breaths spraying the sweaty skin of his neck. “I could not… I was… overcome.”

“How may I persuade you?” Elrohir inquired softly. “That your desire is no encumbrance, nor some ill-born burden I should bear?” 

“You have suffered such indignities out of my ignorance,” Legolas explained haltingly. “It is out of love that I -“

“Ah, my dearest one, speak not of the shades of love when you have not yet known its boldest colors,” Elrohir chided him, but sweetened his sharpness with another kiss. He felt a sprig of tension snake up the prince’s spine. “I am not some simpering halfling in a Warg’s salacious jaws, but an elven warrior of considerable mettle. The grief of heartbreak could not long best me. How could I ever be felled by something so beauteous and enrapturing as your desire?” 

“I… I am not…”

“Not beautiful? Surely you jest,” the prince of Imladris purred into the cream of his temple. “In all of Middle-Earth there is no creature that dares vie for your fair title, no archer keen as your skill. And though I have but begun to discover its creeps and corners, I daresay there is no gentler heart.” 

“Elrohir…”

“The King has well informed me of the gloom that resides there still,” he continued brashly. “I give this black plague notice of imminent destruction, for I will not long suffer the misbegotten musings it provokes in the wild spirit I love so well.”

As the darkling elf traced a viscous trail of caresses along the flushed plain of his brow, Legolas fell silent. His father’s dying words were echoed in his beloved’s own, horrifically so. With a jolting shiver, he recalled those many stark, hungry nights in the Mirkwood crypt, at his father’s grave, fighting with the notion of his legacy, with his growing feelings for his warrior-brother, with himself. The only sense of resolution had come in their bed, or, more acutely, in its perversion. That night, he had known himself more truly than ever before. 

The insufferable reality of this nightmare vision had distorted everything since. 

The prince burrowed deeper into their embrace, cleaving to the elf-knight’s frail frame for hidden reserves emotional fortitude. At last, he ventured: “How can you so easily dismiss the… my brutality, at my father’s house. The manner in which I forced -“

“Aye, you used force, but not against my will.”

“But the bruises. The scars must still…” He found he could not finish, such was the memory’s hold of him. 

“Legolas,” Elrohir insisted, with explicit tenderness. “Your grief was fierce.”

“*You* were grieving, love,” he swallowed hard. “Even then… I recognized the first of your fading at the Warg attack. I knew of your weakness and still I -“

“I gladly bore that dark indulgence,” Elrohir assured him. “And would again, maltaren-nin, should loss overcome you so totally. You were bereft of feeling, and my arms were poor consolation. You required steel, severity, complete surrender… it is in our nature.” Elrohir rested his face against the archer’s crown of flaxen hair. “You required it of me… because you feared the love you bore me. In knowing this, my body’s aches were a small sacrifice.”

“Even then, you… you knew?”

“I knew it the first night of our Rites,” Elrohir confessed, savoring the sensation of his own relief at the admission. “One does not sing so hauntingly, so ravenously to…to one they merely wish to bed. You soul… desired more than the flesh’s comforts, even if you were not yet aware of this longing.” 

Legolas fell pensive, the truth of this affecting him deeply. 

“I have long been alone,” he admitted in a whisper. “Lonely. I have known little else, in all my years.” 

“The peace has become a time of great challenge, to those honor-bound in wartime,” Elrohir remarked. He warmed to a less intimate approach, the shadow of grief looming still. “Centuries of strife does not beget a race of gardeners and ale-brewers. Many of our kind have lost their way… or never known of another. Think of the Galadrrim!! Even as far south as Gondor, there were strange reports from the haunts of Lorien…” 

At his knowing words, Legolas shook off his sorrow. His lips curled, mischievous. 

“Will you tutor me in the weirding ways of peace, beloved?” he asked coyly.

“Only if you swear to the unending worship of my body and soul,” Elrohir laughed heartily. With a heavy sigh, he hugged closer to the Mirkwood prince, submitting to the mounting exhaustion of his still weakened condition.

The archer, however, remained wired with tension. 

“I would swear to this, and much more,” he ventured, his voice aquiver. “I have not yet informed you… last night, when I spoke with Aragorn at the door to your chambers, Elladan told me… the High Council will meet, this day, at the sun’s highest peak.”

“That is soon,” Elrohir remarked, without discernible enthusiasm. He knew the Council’s resolutions, and a restoring sleep beckoned. “You must dress.” 

The elf-knight felt his golden one begin to tremble. In an instant, sleep held little allure. 

“You are weary,” Legolas conceded, attempting to quell the tremors that shook him by slowly beginning to rock his sickly love. “I will see to your comfort.”

“You fear their decision may part us,” Elrohir cut to the quick. “You would that I stand with you.” 

“Your father… he may yet…”

“My father rules Imladris, not my heart.” 

“It is your birthright,” Legolas continued, unwavering. “I would not that you be denied, as I have been, the fulfillment of the dreams of your youth, of your people’s promise…”

“Our people are passing from these lands,” Elrohir reminded him. “Imladris is but a sanctuary to those that linger, perhaps too long, on these shores. I would have the little time allotted us, love, over the rule of a thousand kingdoms. It is the promise of love’s tenderness I dreamt of in my youth, not my father’s throne.”

“And what of Elladan? Must you not chose together?”

“Elladan,” Elrohir mused, thinking of his last conversation with his bashful twin. “He, too, has been gifted by love in these peaceful times. A warrior’s love, at that. We will come to some… understanding. Do not let this trouble you.” He brushed a warm kiss over Legolas’ mouth, but still sensed his unease. “Yet you are troubled still.”

“Melethron,” Legolas barely spoke, the entire length of him shaking in earnest. “I know we are but newly joined, and not yet coupled in the act of love… but would you… would you consider… I am unmannered in the ways of tradition, but could you, perhaps, give thought to… consenting to…”

“Being bound together, by Celeborn,” the darkling elf finished for him, both astounded and heartened by the proposal. 

“Aye,” he exhaled. Legolas raised his head to meet the elf-warrior’s eyes with a look of ravaging sincerity. “It is my dearest wish.” 

The sight of his tempestuous beloved so wreaked by these gentle yearnings momentarily robbed Elrohir of vital breath. On impulse, he crushed their impassioned forms together, his slow-healing body sucking the very force from the prince’s sound frame. 

“Then it is granted,” he cooed, as a knock struck the chamber door. 

* * * 

When the two princes wandered, arms tightly linked, through the ornate archways of their forbears and onto the vermilion slates of the High Council’s terrace court, Elrond stopped cold. As did, amidst quick-retreating ripples of intolerant babble, the awestruck assembly. 

On Elrohir’s impulse, the two strolled over to the cascade of flowering ederwood branches that drooped over the far corner of the balcony. The tree was mostly barren, victim to the noxious dragon fumes that still misted over the surrounding forest, with the exception of one seemingly unimpeachable, honey-colored bloom. The princes of Imladris and Mirkwood bore little mind to the disbelieving eyes that surrounded them; instead, they flattered the resilient tree with their regard. Elrohir caressed the length of the soft-wood bow with an open palm, cradling the lone blossom, then raised the near-translucent petals for the deft archer’s approval. After a bashful, mannered sniff, Legolas pulled away, and sneezed. 

The resulting snicker from his delighted son nearly brought Elrond to tears. 

The Lord of Imladris had not thought to ever see his dear, brave child again, let alone so soon, and so plentifully restored. Though hardly the strength he once was, Elrohir’s progress in one mere night was nothing short of unprecedented among elfkind. Where once death-gray shadows crept, now a giddy pearlescence shined. Though still perilously fragile, his lithe limbs had re-acquired their agility, poise, and feral flow, despite the continued necessity of some form of crutch, be it elven or otherwise. His face evidenced the most noticeable transformation: his cheeks plump, glowing buds, his sharp jawline now of a thicker blade, his eyes alight with a rapt incandescence, and his lips particularly scarlet, ravenous. This radiance could not entirely mask the pain, and, more likely, exhaustion that even now encroached upon him. Elrohir displayed nary a wince of this agony, holding fast in support of his beloved as the archer physically supported him. 

Elrond rose to call the session to order, but found he could not speak. 

While the company of High Elves resumed their tittering, Elladan had rushed over to the ederwood-shroud corner to embrace his healing twin. The sight of their tenderness, of their renewed connection, blindsided Elrond. He felt the heat of Glorfindel’s imploring glare, when the Gondorian consorts joined themselves to the impromptu gathering; Aragorn and Eldarion harkening to a visibly awkward Legolas, even as Arwen clung to her bleary-eyed brothers. At the last, blissfully overwhelmed, the entire party crushed together in one heaving mass of relief, of emotion. 

Elrond faltered, and fell gravely onto his throne. Thranduil, even your cantankerous Silvan wiles would hearten at this incredulous display. 

“Come to order,” Glorfindel announced, taking his place at Elrond’s side. 

The Lord of Imladris straightened in his seat, inwardly suppressing the desire to link arms with Glorfindel as the two princes had. Across the terrace, Elrohir and Legolas parted with a lingering kiss, Elladan guiding his brother over to their place in the circle. Aragorn, Arwen, and Eldarion followed suit, leaving the Mirkwood prince to await his summons. The dulcet elf bore no trace of any anxiety – his warrior’s oath demanded nothing less - though Elrond would not be deceived by this, or any other Silvan ruse. His dread was gripping, and acute. This was clear. 

“Legolas Thranduillion, last son of Mirkwood,” Elrond fearsomely bellowed. “The High Council of Imladris would hear your cause.” 

With brash strides, Legolas marched to the center of the circle and faced the Lord with a hawkish stare. 

“I, Legolas Thranduillion, Eruchin, blood of Sindar, covet the High Council’s fair reason. The Mirkwood of my home has fallen. Its King, dead. I am the last son of his house. My Fate rests with you.”

Elrond nodded severely, deferring to Celeborn, at his left. He rose. 

“The High Council mourns with heavy heart the fallen King of Mirkwood,” he began, his manner blessed with an eerie, Galadrian calm. “And recognizes, in this time of peace among the many Eldar tribes, the might of his reign. The Council has long deliberated on your plight, Legolas of Mirkwood. Our decision is the word and deed of the Valar above, and should you refuse to honor our judgment, you will be banished from their regard, and the care of Imladris. Do you swear to honor the Council’s word?”

“I will hear your judgment before I swear myself to it,” Legolas avowed. The assembled circle bristled at his insolence, though it was spoken with measured restraint. 

“What is this?!” Elrond snapped, unsurprised. 

“I seek no quarrel with this Council,” Legolas amended. “I would be blessed with its good faith. Yet, I am pledged to another, whose Fate will soon be inextricably bound to mine own. I will not choose for him, or myself, until the choice is clear. I would hear your judgment, my Lord.”

“You will hear my judgment, princeling,” Elrond snarled menacingly at him, rising from his throne like the dragon from valley hollows. “If you wish it so.”

“*Ada*,” Elrohir protested, struggling to rise. His white-knuckle grip clasped to both Aragorn and Elladan’s outstretched, bracing arms, he inwardly cursed himself for not accepting the earlier offer of Mithrandir’s walking stick. 

Legolas watched this struggle with disbelief, madly battling to contain the impulse to go to him. 

“My Lord,” Elrohir corrected himself. “I would address the Council on this matter.”

Elrond blanched at the sight, guilt searing an acid path to his core.

“The Prince of Imladris would speak,” Aragorn echoed, with regal imposition. 

Celeborn placed a firm hand on Elrond’s shoulder, then both Eldar took their seats. 

“You may speak, Elrohir, son of Elrond,” Celeborn acquiesced with a simple nod.

The elf-knight shuffled cautiously forward, only to be met by Legolas’ steady grip. As he guided him to the center of the circle, Elrohir felt the harsh beats of the fair archer’s pulse merge with his own, though his gentle demeanor betrayed none of the voracious apprehension that thundered within. Not wanting to provoke Elrond further, Legolas took solid hold of his beloved, but the bulk of him remained at a judicious distance apart. 

Before his address, Elrohir locked eyes with his dear maltaren, silently reminding him of their mutual affection. The gesture spoke volumes to the assembled company. 

“Though this is a Council of matters of rule and law among our people,” Elrohir commented wryly. “I would speak of matters of the heart. Of *my* heart.” He turned to meet his father’s withering stare with tender eyes. “I have lived a righteous life, at the service of the Valar, of the Eldar, of Imladris my home. Throughout my life, I have seen the balance of shadow and light: my mother, who could not bear the perils of this world, fled to Valinor; my sister, who embraced the love of a man of this Middle-Earth, chose a mortal life. I have waged terrible war on the plains of this land and I have rode over every region, awestruck by its formidable beauty. Never alone, for my soul is twinned to another, but lonely. Uncoupled. Itinerant. Never could I rest, when the threat of Mordor beckoned. When a warrior’s life was the only life I could safely know, to keep safe my home, my people.

“The War is ended, the Shadow fallen, and my heart… has strayed from these timely preoccupations. Know this: when you choose the Fate of this thorn-stemmed flower of the Mirkwood greens, you choose my own. For by Elbereth, I will nevermore be parted from him.”

Legolas shut his eyes, his beloved’s words piercing the knife’s edge of his self-control through. He fought desperately to smote the blaze of love within him, to meet the Council’s verdict with honor, if not obedience. 

“What say you on this, Prince of Mirkwood?” Celeborn asked, with potent meaning. 

The archer felt their searing glares raze over him, blunt, demanding. His warrior’s heart rose to meet their challenge, as he raised the lids of his eyes with purposeful temperance. 

“I am not one for pontification,” he shot true, in Elrond’s direction. “Or times of peace. I have known no other life than that of a warrior, and would have none other. Yet peace has come, my father dead, and our people in retreat… I am uncertain of my place on this Middle-Earth, or elsewhere. I know but one truth. I would bind my soul to this Prince of Imladris, to this son of Elrond. To this best and most beautiful Elrohir of my heart.” 

In this breathless moment, the assembly turned to Elrond. Immersed in the audacity of these declarations, he had allowed Glorfindel to weave their long fingers into a familiar clasp; this touch was the only point of warmth in the entirety of his stern, frigid frame. As Elrohir, courted by a mounting fatigue, was welcomed into the archer’s caring arms, Glorfindel stroked a soothing, sentimental touch over the flex of Elrond’s bent knees. This haunting gesture recalled another Council session, long ago, when the meat of the matter was the emergence of their own love, with Elrond still bound to the departed Celebrian. The mother of his children; a marriage of convenience. /They will not suffer for their love as we did, melethron./

Elrond rose once more, with imposing determination. 

“Legolas Thranduillion,” Elrond proclaimed. “The High Council is decided. You are Prince of Mirkwood no longer. The once-green wood is abandoned, and thus the proposed reign of its new King and heir forfeit.” A hush fell over the company, each eager for further news. “Yet you are pledged to greater cares than Mirkwood, and these are to be respected. You are foresworn to wait-out the life of the King of Gondor. The Council sees no need to alter this. After his death, you will proceed to Valinor, with the last of the Elven people. Those that remain after your departure choose a mortal life.

“There are those, in the forest of Lorien, that have made this choice. The last of the Galadrrim reside there still. Among these fearsome archers will you make your home, until such time as you pass over the Sea. I, myself, and those who chose to follow, will shortly pass to Valinor, and with us, the sanctuary of Imladris. And so, in the light of the Valar, I name you King Legolas, of Lothlorien.” 

Legolas reeled, this once gripping tight to Elrohir. 

Elrond smirked pridefully, as the assembly held their breath. He continued: “My dearest Elrohir, child of my heart, I name you heir to my Lordship, and ruler of the Eldar on this Middle-Earth.” He looked out, over the company, to further emphasize the resounding impact of his pronouncements. “These two Lords of the realm will be bound, and crowned, in a fortnight’s time. These celebrations will be the last, and the greatest, of these homely halls. Those that sail for Valinor will depart the following dawn. Those that part for Lothlorien, and delay their choice, may leave at their Lords’ leisure.

This is the High Council’s decree, under the Light of the Valar.”

The other members of the Council bowed their heads in agreement. As was the custom, the High Elven rose in unison, then filed away through the furthest arch, under the pious faces of Feanor and Gil-galad enshrined in the silver sheen of the stone. Lord Elrond, the last to exit, paused briefly by the carved robes of Ingwe, Glorfindel waiting ahead, to catch one final glimpse of his court, of his contented family. 

He sighed, once, then kept on. 

After the High Council’s decree, a dormant hush seemed to blanket over peerless Imladris herself. The remains of the elven company, though inwardly consumed by an unseemly, gnawing need to rumormonger, drifted off into the gloom-brushed halls of the Last Homely House. Only the children of Elrond and their lovers stayed behind, their faces beaming, yet ambivalent at the news of the passing of both their father and of their home into legend. 

Legolas had long before swept Elrohir into a back-breaking embrace. His beloved shroud in the deep of his arms, Legolas whispered to him with a secret, silken tongue, the intimacy of these private thoughts moistening their eyes. Reluctant to interrupt, the King and Queen of Gondor instead coddled their awestruck son, who struggled to repress his thousand queries about the events he’d actually witnessed firsthand. 

Mindful of overt attention, Erestor, who had surreptitiously returned, tread measuredly across the terrace, courting Elladan’s attention. They, too, quietly conferred. After a veritable festival’s worth of crimson shades colored the Loremaster’s cheeks, he nodded intently, then turned to address his twin. Elrohir, immersed in both bountiful relief and crushing fatigue, was by this point cradled snugly in the future Lord of Lorien’s arms, his head tucked against his shoulder.

“Brother,” Elrohir himself beckoned, reaching out to his twin but unable to long sustain the stretch. “I would speak with you of these tidings.”

“Be assured, Elrohir,” Elladan replied, before the question was posed. “I bear you no ill, and will serve both the brother and the Lord with equal devotion.” 

“This, I never doubted, gwanur-nin,” the elf-knight confirmed. “I merely wished… do you long for Valinor, as well? Will you pass over with Ada?” 

“Is there no need for elf-lore among the fearsome Galadrrim?” Elladan teased, his answer implicit. “I would not leave the transcribing of the tales and legends of the Eruchin to such impatient, unlearned spirits as yourselves.” 

The familiar company laughed, and drew closer together, Erestor weaving a tentative arm around the Loremaster’s waist. 

“And you, Chief Protector,” Elrohir submitted. “What will you find to occupy that keen strategist’s mind once Imladris is laid to rest?” 

“Lorien’s borders need tending,” Legolas remarked, complicit. “Those willful Galadrrim crave a wise general’s discipline. There is a place, in the white lady’s woods, for such a strict and seasoned archer, should you, too, wish to postpone your journey overseas awhile.” 

“Aye, the task suits me well,” Erestor solemnly agreed. “For I would not dare be parted from one to whom I was bound this very morn.” 

At this announcement, Elladan blanched, while a chorus of exclamations burst forth from the others. 

“*Bound*?” Elrohir gasped, vaguely distressed that he was not party to the ceremony. 

Elladan shot a cutting look of reproach at Erestor, but could not long keep compassion from his eyes. The Imladrian general was brusque, impulsive; indeed, this brashness had helped win over Elladan’s oft-timid nature, had led directly to their joining under this past sunrise. 

“Dearest one,” Elladan cooed to his twin, struggling to explain this uncharacteristic spontaneity. “You know I am of humble heart… I did not wish… you were unwell…” 

“Hush, gwanur,” Elrohir insisted warmly. “If you are bound in love, then I am glad of it. Though it troubles me that you waste such precious hours on this, the day of your binding, with my regretful troubles. Go!! Take solace in each other’s arms!! I shall not hear another word from you until we are both… sufficiently *rested*.”

Elladan didn’t dare reply, but instead hurried to embrace his highly amused twin, then escaped with Erestor to the sanctity of his Loremaster’s chambers. 

As Elrohir attempted to stifle an unseemly yawn, the Gondorian consorts approached them. After blessing her drowsy brother’s brow with an approving kiss, Arwen clasped his heavy hand in hers.

“Rest well, my brave one,” she smiled serenely. “But before, the King and I would entreat your counsel on a small matter.” 

“Which is this?” the darkling elf asked in a mumble, his lashes batting rapidly as he fought to stay focused. 

“Another time, perhaps, my Lady Undomiel,” Legolas ventured, anxious to have Elrohir take rest. Then, to the elf-knight: “Beloved, you are worn raw.” 

“A simple request, mellon-nin,” Aragorn pushed in. “Our son is now without a guardian. If he is to be fit to reign as a king of our lineage, he will need schooling in the elven ways of war. Who better to tutor him that the two finest warriors the Eldar have among their ranks?”

“You would the Prince live in Lorien?” Legolas reeled. Mischievous as ever, he raised a knowing brow at the King’s madness. “*You*, Aragorn, would part with your only son?” 

“Two season only,” Arwen cautioned him. “I would have my boy know his sisters. Half a year in training at Lorien, and half a year in practice, at court. Fair trade for the bounty of elven wiles.”

“Indeed,” Legolas winked at Eldarion, who could not seem more pleased at the prospect of such adventures. “Well, then. After the Lord of Imladris has passed, we will journey to Minas Tirith. Elrohir, as well, must collect his treasury of armor there. Elladan and Erestor will be tasked with taming the roguish Galadrrim, and we will arrive at Lorien to a king’s welcome.” Suddenly, Legolas caught wind of his Elrondian tone, then giggled mercilessly at himself. “I did not think I would well-bear a Lord’s burdens, but this last decree bore a whiff of Glorfindel’s cunning, if I may commend myself.” The friends shared a hearty laugh at this self-reflection. Gingerly, he kissed the crown of Elrohir’s raven hair. “What say you, melethron?” 

The Elf-lord, regretfully, had already fallen asleep. 

* * * 

In exasperation, Elrohir tugged the elliptical elf-crown from its nest around his head and aggressively tinkered with the shape of the fused mithril twines. Though the dwarves newly settled in a restored Moria had themselves taken his measure, and thereby forged a magnificently intricate mantle for Elrond’s heir, the haste required had forgotten certain subtleties. Such as leaf stems that did not dig into one’s scalp, a down-lined interior whose quill edges did not scrape, temple-clamps crafted in the likeness of his witch-sword that did not pinch to near-blindness. 

He clunked the silver garland down onto the marbled stone of the long banquet table, grunted, and glared at it. 

“Not a day’s rule yet passed,” Aragorn snickered. “And already you scorn the burden of leadership.” 

“It is the dwarves’ skill I scorn, or lack thereof,” Elrohir grumbled, but not without a gentle smirk. “The metal chafes me raw.” 

“Aye, clearly, you are restless,” Aragorn continued to needle him. His slate-blue eyes wandered across the hall, where the Lord of Lorien held court amidst a quiver of rapt archer-comrades. By the King of Gondor’s estimation, he was recounting his own part in the final hours of the Battle of Hornburg, at the Helm. It would perhaps require such an army to tare their enthralled gazes away from Legolas’ peerless radiance. “But does the blame truly rest on your crown?” 

The blazing look the brittle half-elven shot in the archer’s direction confirmed his suspicions. Elrohir locked eyes with his beloved, and sighed. 

Aragorn laughed heartily. “You are well matched. Many a night, this last week, has the Queen’s rest been disturbed by Legolas’ midnight wanderings, creeping into our chambers to beg for my company. The restoration of your health brings many blessings, gwanur-nin.” 

“Indeed,” Elrohir snipped, though an ache of an entirely different nature still gnawed at the core of him. They were bound and crowned now, true, but not yet coupled, and still the feasting raged on around them. The last night of Imladris. How could they, in good conscience, excuse themselves at such an early hour? Thus, Legolas trafficked with the Galadrrim by the terrace doors and Elrohir was sequestered behind the banquet table, his longing grown more palpable than the taste of miruvor from his goblet.

The sight of his resplendent beloved did little to smite this long-simmering desire. Clad in a palette of rich, aquatic greens, the Lorien Lord’s lithe frame bristled with bold vitality, as if ready to pounce. A fortnight of day-long advisory meetings with each member of the High Council had done nothing to tame his cutthroat ways, though this ritual retelling of war-tales bode well for their initial relations with the Galadrrim and bespoke the hidden reserves of soldier’s wisdom in the veteran archer. They were, indeed, well-counseled and well-matched. 

The golden beams of the surrounding candelabra coupled with the moon’s warm glow to flatter the Lord of Lorien’s flaxen mane, cream-kissed skin, and cerulean eyes. The quicksilver sheen of his own mithril crown reflected these ethereal sources, bathing the mercurial elf with a celestial aura, as if Manwe himself had descended from above. Despite this Valarian grace, when Elrohir regarded him thus, he saw through an archer’s ease at storytelling, a beauty’s unconsciously affecting poise. He saw through to the ferocious soul that basked in a cunning kill, the shame-wrecked prince that trembled in his arms, the misguided heart that shot down when it should have opened, to save. 

These flaws he loved so dearly well, and cherished deep within. 

From the opposing end of the banquet table, his father gestured to the waiting minstrels. They struck up a quaint, cheerful melody, which suited the company. Many among them rose to dance, including his twin with a fiercely reluctant Erestor, and the Queen of Gondor with her eager son. Aragorn remained at his side, knowing, as Elrohir did, that to dance with his beloved would do little to encourage their continued attendance at the celebrations. Instead, the King clamped a warm hand on his brother’s arm and squeezed fondly. 

“I was quite moved at the time of your binding, gwanur,” Aragorn commented with affection. “I have not witnessed such tenderness since… well, perhaps the comparison is unjust. At mine own, I had eyes for little other than Arwen…”

“Aye, even now, that is plain,” Elrohir ribbed him, as the King’s dewy gaze rarely shied far away from the Lady Evenstar. “But tell me, Estel, may she travel well in her condition?”

“As well as a lone, grief-sick elf through Mirkwood ashes,” Aragorn retorted, then thought better. “And more ably, still, at that. It is yet six month till our child will be born, four before her confinement. I hold some fears… but without her father’s healing here, she will need a midwife’s care. Best we return to Gondor.” 

“Well reasoned,” Elrohir agreed. 

“And you, gwanur?” Aragorn broached, with slight trepidation. “Do you feel… entirely restored?”

“I have progressed,” Elrohir admitted wearily. “Though I still tire under prolonged strain. Horseback always soothes me, but I engaged the young prince in swordplay late last afternoon, and I slept through supper, till morn. Legolas was… overly attentive, this morning, to be kind.” 

“The binding Rites, surely, have strengthened you,” the King supposed.

“They have,” the Elf-lord acknowledged with a smile. “As does the night’s promise…” 

“Legolas will surely push you to delay such intimacy,” Aragorn remarked bemusedly. 

“Perhaps,” Elrohir noted, enigmatic, as he watched the Galadrrim applaud the conclusion of their new Lord’s tale. 

Conscious of the constant appraisal of his husband’s gaze, Legolas strolled over to the minstrels and beseeched a word with their lute-playing leader. Their deal struck, he silenced his companions with a glance, then rose to address the revelers. 

“My Lords and Ladies of Imladris,” the lute-player announced. “The Lord of Lorien would grace us with a song.” 

The crowd applauded, all turning towards the balustrade, where Legolas now stood. As the minstrels prepared themselves, he took a sweeping bow, then fixed full, loving eyes on his Elrohir. There was no need for a formal dedication. The darkling elf took a long, steadying breath, then stood to welcome this incumbent treasure, the gift of his husband’s song. 

To Elrohir, the music began with a jolt, the first chord striking true. As the strains wafted, like the balming swells of a mineral bath, around him, he was lulled into the stream of the rich, enveloping refrain just as Legolas began to sing the Lay of Leithian. His lush, yearning voice caught his beloved in a rapturous thrall. As on the first night of their then warrior’s Rites, a brazing heat fused through the length of Elrohir’s skin, every shift in the archer’s tone breaking another sultry wave over him. Yet his eloquence was equally seductive, the archer’s voice thick with a lonely heart’s longing, tremulous before the promise of eternal devotion. 

Hopelessly unmoored by the last of the song’s intoxicating beauty, Elrohir blithely shut his eyes. His dear, incandescent husband best remain by the balustrade, else this portion of the festivities would indeed be swiftly ended. Before the thought could pass on, he felt the charge of Legolas’ arms around him, nestling him close. The most gracious of hands cupped his face, as soft, still-timid lips suckled at his mouth. 

“Melethron,” Legolas rasped, his smooth voice now perverted by longing. “Do you tire?”

“Nay, I am quite well,” Elrohir protested, reluctantly breaking their kiss to prove his cause by the sharpness of his eyes. 

“You are *weary*,” Legolas insisted, a glint of mischief rimming his pregnant stare. “We must presently retire. Take some rest…” The archer’s nimble fingers brushed down the length of his back, cupping a firm grip even further down. 

Elrohir, head swimming with echoes of his beloved’s song, readily complied with this small deception. He allowed desire to overtake him, the luxury of Legolas’ proximity, his velvet touch, the overpowering scent of his body, ripe with sweat.

The Elf-lord swooned, and sagged into his embrace. The efficacy of the resulting gasps made him snuff a laugh into the crook of Legolas’ arm, almost giving the game away. A chorus of concern forced the Lord of Lorien to usher him away to their chambers.

The Lord was more than eager to comply. 

* * *

“You may cradle him in slumber, but do not cling,” Elrond seemed to be concluding. At least, Legolas desperately hoped for this. “His chest may be constricted. He must not feel crushed, or any restraint…” The former Lord of Imladris continued patiently on, meticulous in his instruction, demonstrating no apparent signs of fatigue, distress, or… self-awareness. 

Legolas exhaled in slow, measured breaths, his voracious tongue prodding at the cage of his clenched teeth. The diaphanous gauze of his innermost robe clung to the sweat-soaked length of his skin; the fall of the outermost layer barely concealing the moist blunt of his barrel-thick shaft. He nodded once, with studied severity, and prayed that the green of the silk sheath was dark enough to absorb any over-drip. He could not for any decent stretch of time avoid the thought of Elrohir, waiting and surely naked beyond the chamber doors at his back; thus any wits that may have served to quickly assure Elrond both of his son’s continued health and of Legolas’ capacity to care for him were dangerously preoccupied. 

Before, as he had lain the limp body of his mock-dormant love onto their bed, Elrohir had surreptitiously tickled his fingers over the archer’s wrist, then fluttered their feathery tips along the soft of his inner-arm, an echo of the need withheld on the night they declared their love. As the overbearing father droned on, the Lord of Lorien now sorely regretted using the half-elven’s weakness as a ruse, the memory of that teasing touch ghosting up his slick arms, taunting him with the later promise of grips, strokes, clutches...

Legolas swallowed hard, struggled to focus. 

“*Ada*,” the son-in-law assuaged with familiarity. “I am ever grateful of your fond counsel, but I must tend to him, before he may rest.”

This chastened Elrond. “I had not thought on this,” he admitted sheepishly. 

“Do not be troubled,” Legolas added intuitively. “Though the blanket of winter descends, do not let it shroud your heart in sorrow, in doubt. Rejoice!! Imladris was a kingdom of plenty, your children are rich in love, and our dearest elf-knight will yet be replenished by slumber. Your eyes will bear this witness, on the morrow.” 

“Aye,” Elrond admitted, but did not seem convinced. “Sage counsel, Legolas. I have chosen wisely.” At this, the Lord of Lorien met his law-father with an easy smile. “Rest well, my brave one.” 

“Hannon le, Ada.” 

With a last flick of his eyes over the chamber doors, Elrond bowed in deference, then slipped back down the shadowy hall. Legolas sighed mightily, spun on his heel, and swished through the arched entrance of their rooms. 

There, he met with a sight that stirred the very bowels of his self-control. 

Elrohir, bare and hauntingly beautiful, before his very eyes. 

For him, only. 

“Melethron,” Elrohir beckoned, stepping further into the glow of the surrounding candlelight. 

Offering himself. 

Ache knotted into his straining groin, the light wool folds of his robes evidencing a painfully visceral bulge. Legolas gnawed on the inside of his cheek, drawing blood, smoothing the flint-rock taste through his mouth. Instinctively, he thought of the plains of Pellenor, the heat of hand to hand combat, and his body surged. Hungry, wanting, he fisted into the bristled fabric at his sides, as if to restrain himself. A deranged fever raged through his veins, kin to the bruising lust of that thoughtless Mirkwood midnight, fogging his judgment and urging him to attack the stately grace of the supple, sensuous frame before him. 

Elrohir tread quietly forward, brushing kind, lingering hands over the archer’s heaving chest. Careful to maintain some distance between them, the darkling elf nevertheless leaned in to suckle, almost sweetly, at the scarlet smear of Legolas’ lips. 

In the very instant of this tenderness, the fever quelled. 

“My father serves me well,” Elrohir appraised, as his heady gaze licked up the luscious length of him. “His dull lecturing has left you ready.” He stroked a knowing hand over his tenting robes, raised a daring eyebrow. “Ripe.” With a flick of his tongue, he opened the archer’s warm, wanting mouth, drawing deeply, claiming him. 

“Hold tight, beloved. I will have you now.” 

Arms of astonishing strength gingerly assaulted him, whipping open his belt and buckles, yanking off his boots, tearing through the ties that bound him and swiftly shedding his robes. All the while, Elrohir never missed an opportunity to fondle, tease, or ardently caress a bare patch, a sheer slope of the Lorien Lord’s buttery skin. Soon tangled in a satin mess on the floor, Legolas laughed, shrieked, and squealed as the elf-knight bit sharply into his purple nipples, then vigorously balmed their stiff nubs with lively laps. Snaking his legs around Elrohir’s waist, the fair archer had long abandoned any trailing thought of Mirkwood, mad lust, or other than his own impending ravaging. 

When Elrohir gripped seasoned fingers around the root of his engorgement, he abandoned all thought whatsoever. 

As mauling hands pumped over the nest of bloated nerves at his base, the avenging tongue circled his pearly head, laving its ring of viscous droplets across eager lips. Waves of raven hair spilled over his thighs, his lap, nearly obscuring the rapt, indigo eyes that bore into his woozy senses, forcing him to watch as his one, truest lover swallowed the whole of him. 

Legolas reared, wild, bucking into the molten deep of his mouth, a fury of feeling singing through him, nothing like raw, nothing like flesh, nothing like lust. Ever sure of his aim, he soon shot a stream of searing bolts down the elf-knight’s throat, the smack of release nearly winding him. Legolas collapsed into the gauzy folds beneath him, tears welling in the cerulean pools of his eyes.

One thought alone gripped him. /This… this is his heart’s loving. This is love./ 

His tawdry gaze only for the lovely, listless archer, Elrohir crept up alongside of him, linking their still-wanting limbs together. With considerate delicacy, he slowly unwound his beloved’s intricate braids, expertly separating, then smoothing, the flaxen strands, as Legolas struggled to regain his composure. The darkling elf hummed raggedly throughout this task, occasionally bowing to kiss a flush cheek, the blue hollow of a temple, the pale cast of his brow. 

When Legolas snuck his hesitant lips up to meet his lover’s own, he forced down another sweep of sorrow. Elrohir met the kiss with ample tenderness, moving to cradle him. 

“Take your ease, maltaren-nin,” he murmured gently. “The night is young, and this first love-act would strike true to the most seasoned of hearts.” 

“You seem little troubled by it,” Legolas noted morosely. 

“One need not weep to be moved by the sight of his love,” Elrohir remarked, the violet glow of his eyes enveloping him anew. “My beauty.” 

Instantly repentant, Legolas tightened their embrace, as if using his lithe form to dam the tide that flooded through him. 

Elrohir sensed his unease, and cooed: “I should have taken greater care to prepare you, melethron-nin. For elfkind, the Rites of love are more potently felt than for any other creature on Middle-Earth. Few, after experiencing such passions, may return to a mortal love’s bed. For some, the act can be… shattering.”

“Aye, it is fierce as the rush of the mighty Anduin,” Legolas conceded, head nuzzling into the darkling elf’s shoulder, to steady itself. “As if I’d drained an entire barrel of Dwarf ale. I am drunk with it.” Shimmering eyes beamed upwards, his mischievous smile retuning with a vengeance. “With your scent, melethron. With need of you…” He lay the languorous bulk of his lean, muscular body across the swaths of aquamarine satin, exposing himself to Elrohir’s lingering gaze. 

In another of the night’s glorious firsts, the elf-knight soon felt himself stir to full, scorching potency. With a wicked glint, Legolas grazed the already-glistening tip of his log-fat arousal, then raised his sinuous fingers, generously coated with the translucent sap, to his waiting lips, sucking wantonly. Elrohir growled, ground their hips together. Blunt, brutal jolts of pleasure stabbed up the archer’s spine, enflaming him to full, decadent hardness. The darkling elf pinned his fair lover beneath him, ready hands parting his all-too-malleable legs, reaching between them to stroke their slicked lengths in unison. 

The smoldering friction that resulted nearly bested them both. 

“Melethron,” Elrohir groaned, somehow corralling his senses to produce speech. Legolas was almost sentient enough to be envious. “Does this please you…? Or would you that I… that I…”

“Please, Elrohir,” Legolas begged outright, gripping vehemently into the head that recklessly stained his neck with crimson culls. “Have me… Have my loving…Have my heart…” 

Caught in the frenzy of stroking hands, of mounting heat, of the honey-thick salve that readied him, Legolas was conscious only of a keen, immaculate rapture, the awesome thrall of his lover’s sensuous attentions. As if sinking into a tranquil pond, the elf-knight sheathed himself deep within the lank archer; the sheer ecstasy of this joining blazing through him like dragon’s fire. 

For several bliss-drunk moments, Legolas heard nothing but his love’s husky grunts, his own feral pants, felt nothing but the singe of that hot mouth over his own, knew nothing but the throb of their writhing loins, the thunderous pound of his telltale heart. When, undone at last, Legolas spent himself across the taut wash of his abdomen, Elrohir could do nothing but so bless him in return, releasing a white-hot gush into the secret, sacred core of him. 

The Elf-lord soon fell over him, his last reserves of strength drained resolutely hollow by their voracious coupling. 

Legolas hugged him close, drank in their sweet, musky scent. A fugue of peace descended, bathing his passion-soaked mind, his sated body in a swell of opulent affection. 

“My glorious elf-knight,” he purred against his cheek. “Radiant star-rider… most eloquent and ethereal husband…” 

“And what of my fearsome ways?” Elrohir chuckled softly, unable to sleep with Legolas so unwound. There was such ease in his dear maltaren’s voice, such contentment. It heartened him. “Lesser elves would tremble before one of such lethal skill, you would be well to remind yourself.”

“Aye, I did tremble,” Legolas insisted, still mildly delirious. “I quaked. I scorned and cursed and shunned, but was soon tempered. Tamed. By your valiant heart, my beloved.”

“You are no such thing,” the darkling elf chided, with implicit tenderness.

“I am yours,” he whispered, sinking deeper still into their embrace, until their two slender, gracious forms neatly melded into one. “By Elbereth, I have known no other’s light. No other’s love. 

In this, I surrender to you, Elrohir of my heart.”

 

The End

 

A/N: ‘Hannon le.’ Thank you.


End file.
